That One Naruto Time Travel Thing
by Redyoshi14
Summary: Naruto wakes up one morning to the Sage wanting him to redo his life. Something about it being too convenient.
1. Chapter 1

"You're being sent back in time."

Naruto, who had now more or less shrugged off his drowsiness, just stared at the apparition before him.

"Excuse me?"

"We're sending you back in time, Naruto. We feel its for the best," the apparition known as Hagoromo repeated, his face stern and completely serious. Naruto simply tilted his head.

"Okay," Naruto responded, "why?"

"We feel its for the best," the Sage of Six Paths repeated. Naruto waited a bit to see if the Sage was going to continue. He was not.

"Okay, why do you think its for the best?" Naruto clarified. He had finally gotten to the point where he was supremely happy in his life. He had achieved his lifelong dream of being Hokage, and started a family to fill in the void he was missing almost his entire life. He had a loving wife, and a beautiful daughter. Yeah, his son was a rebellious punk, but he reminded the blond Hokage of himself when he was younger so there was a certain pride in that as well.

Not to mention that it was also kinda his fault his son was acting out. So there was that.

Point being, he was really happy where he was in his life and had absolutely no intention of going back. Having to redo _everything_ to exactly the way it was before just seemed ridiculous, especially considering the kinda shit he had to go through.

Holy shit that whole fiasco with Sasuke! That happened! It seemed like almost a lifetime ago but _he and Sasuke had totally saved the world_.

Oh and Sakura and the rest of the ninja world was there as well. Details.

The Sage of Six Paths just shook his head. "We believe that-"

"Its for the best?" Naruto finished inquisitively. He was hit on the head with the Sage's staff.

"No," Hagoromo answered, "we believed that you were too lucky in the events concerning your life. A lot of the things that went down in your," Hagoromo paused to find the right words,"... sordid life seemed a bit _too_ coincidental."

Naruto bristled, "Really? Like what?"

"Like the time you just so happened to awaken the chakra of Kurama exactly when you needed it on the bridge in Wave?"

Naruto scowled slightly, "that happened? Kurama, did that happen?"

The tailed beast inside him groaned, "what? Maybe," The giant fox then noticed the Sage, "sup gramps."

"Gramps" nodded in kind, having somehow heard that.

Naruto nodded as well, "I don't clearly remember that, but I know it made sense."

"Oh really? Then how about that time that you somehow outran an entire train?" Hagoromo continued.

"When the hell was that?"

"The mission to Snow Country. To save the princess? Yukie?"

"How the hell do you know about that?" Naruto asked.

"Details," Hagoromo answered.

"Fine," Naruto replied, not caring either way, "I can easily outrun a train. I can outrun _light_ if I really wanted to. Hell, my Dad used to do it all the time."

"You were thirteen at the time."

"I was a gifted youngster," Naruto replied.

"Earlier that day you struggled to outrun a horse."

"I was also determined."

"Determined enough to outrun a train?"

"You underestimate my determination."

"Very well," Hagoromo explained, "then that time you managed to survive Itachi and Kisame?"

"Ero-sennin was there."

"Sasuke was there before him," Hagoromo retorted.

"He was still there."

"And how about that whole 'three year hiatus' the Akatsuki went on? Explain that?"

"They had their reasons."

"Explain them."

"I don't pretend to understand the minds of deranged S-ranked criminals."

"Explain beating Neji."

"Determination"

"And getting Pein to bring everyone back to life?"

"Talk no Jutsu is a fearsome ability."

Hagoromo just rolled his eyes, surpressing a more exaggerated response.

"Whatever, you're being sent back in time."

"Why?" Naruto asked.

"We feel its for the best," Hagoromo responded.

Naruto stared at the Sage, "you know, you're being difficult."

"So are you, Asura," the Sage responded.

"I'm not your son."

"But you _are_ being sent back in time," the Sage answered, twirling his staff in a circle. Instantly they were transported from Naruto's bedroom to a weird, void-like dimension. There was almost nothing in it, random colors just flowing in the background.

"Huh, so this is what being sent back in time is like," Naruto commented, looking around, "very pretty."

Kyuubi chose this time to chime back in, "you're taking this really well, Naruto."

Naruto looked at his stomach, "give me a minute."

"You'll be sent back to about the time you were scheduled to take the Genin Exam. We want to see how your life would go if you weren't so lucky," the Sage continued.

Naruto looked back at the Sage, "yeah, about that. _Why_ exactly do you think I'll just play along? I have about enough power to _completely and totally annihilate every single person in the Elemental Nations on a whim_. There are about a grand total of, what, zero people who can stop me? I'm assuming you want me to play out my life as I did when I was a child with slight differences. That's not going to happen."

Purely out of spite, Naruto neglected to add. He was not excited about being pulled back in time and away from everything he loved.

"Oh, good question," the Sage stated, glee in his eyes. With a twirl of his staff, Naruto was once again a child. Looking at his now much shorter arms and terrible jumpsuit outfit, all Naruto could do was shrug.

"Yeah, I expected as much. No big deal."

Hagoromo chuckled, "you're taking this well."

Naruto shrugged again, "well yeah. I can still use Shadow Clone Jutsu and Rasengan. That's literally my entire arsenal. I have learned literally nothing else in my entire tenure as Shinobi so just being smaller isn't going to really change how I fight."

"We're also taking away your toad summoning," Hagoromo continued, "you hadn't signed its contract yet where we're dumping you."

"Oh," Naruto stated, "will that take away my Sage Mode?"

Hagoromo thought about it. "It shouldn't. I think that's just you being really still."

"Then that's fine. I hadn't summoned Gamakichi in a while anyway. He would be about the size of my palm anyway," Naruto responded, a hand on his chin, "what about Kurama? Do I still have the fuzzball?"

"Hey fuck you, brat."

Hagoromo decidedly ignored the interaction, "Yes."

"Then I hadn't really lost anything but the ability to get the ramen out the top drawer."

"You'd be surprised at how much that changes things."

For once since he woke up that morning he agreed with the Sage.

"Also, you're allowed to bring one person with you."

At this Naruto perked up. At least he wouldn't be totally alone. Hey! He could totally bring Himawari and COMPLETELY fuck with some heads!

"You can't bring people who weren't born yet," Hagoromo continued, as if sensing the neo-boy's intentions. Naruto visibly deflated. He didn't really care about that clause anymore.

"Although, I suppose you could bring Bolt if its that important to you."

"No," Naruto responded without hesitation. He was not bringing his son back. No way in hell could the world handle two of him. He continued thinking on it.

"Can I bring back Sasuke?"

Hagoromo looked at him funny, "I would assume you would like to bring back your wife."

Naruto shook his head. "Nah. If we went back together we'd probably immediately attempt some very disgusting and VERY wrong prepubescent sex. That'd kinda mess up your intentions of keeping things the same."

Hagoromo held up a finger, "oh right. About that. You don't exactly have a choice whether or not things change. No matter what you do things will attempt to go the way they originally did."

"Explain."

"The gods that hired me to do this find your life and subsequent misfortune extremely entertaining. No matter what you do they will find a way to push it back on track."

"Oh," Naruto intelligently responded, "well in that case fuck you and fuck them."

Hagoromo held his finger back up, a hand to his ear. "The gods say that now they're going to actively fuck with you."

Naruto shrugged.

"So who are you going to bring?" Hagoromo asked.

Naruto thought on it. He could bring Sakura. Having a super useful and ultra powerful kunoichi on his side would help things a lot. It also sweetened the deal in that it meant that there would be no super annoying useless mass of pink hair on his team. Her endless strength was the result of excellent chakra control right? That didn't change with age. She would still be powerful.

The downside to that would be that she wouldn't be entirely too happy with being torn away from her family either. Her dreams and goals of not only catching up in strength to her two teammates, but also marrying Sasuke were also fulfilled, and she would probably punch him into paste the instant she realized what happened.

It was for these reasons he couldn't choose Sasuke either. The Mangekyo Sharingan was related to experience, which meant that while he might lose his Rinnegan, the now proud Uchiha father would still have access to Ameterasu. Having to constantly look over your shoulder for terrible black flames was NOT how he wished to spend his renewed childhood.

He couldn't bring back Hinata either. He didn't know how the process worked, but he didn't want to leave his children without either parents, regardless of whether or not the gods left a copy of him or if time rewinded.

"We're doing a split timeline thing. Your universe will literally be paused while we're doing this," Hagoromo explained, "you'll be returned when you reach this point again."

Oh. Well either way, everyone he just listed would not appreciate being ripped from their families to relive most of their own lives anyway. He needed someone who he could count on that also wouldn't have their lives ruined. Someone like-

"Akamaru. I want Akamaru at my side," Naruto stated, a straight face on.

Kyuubi literally howled with laughter. Hagoromo just looked confused.

"No," he finally responded. Kyuubi had not stopped laughing from his place in Naruto's gut.

"Why not?" Naruto asked.

"Cause Akamaru is not a person. Also, how would that help you?"

Naruto shrugged, "I dunno. I just figured he would like being young again. A dual benefit."

"Pick someone else," the Sage responded, pinching the bridge of his nose.

With his first option out of the way, Naruto could only think of one other person he'd rather have with him, "Neji."

"Done," Hagoromo stated, and with a twirl of his staff, the previously dead Hyuuga boy was standing next to the seated Naruto. He was about as old as he was when Naruto was taking the Genin Exam.

"Huh, wait, what?" Neji Hyuuga asked, clearly confused. "Where am I?" he asked, before seeing Naruto smiling up at him. "Is this hell?"

"Nope, Neji, we're in an interdimensional space and time loop," Naruto answered, now giddy. He was already starting to get excited since he now realize that there would be no consequences. This was like a big game to the gods and he was a chess piece right? If he could just go back when the game was over there would be no problem.

Neji just looked at Naruto like he was crazy, "I see, and why am I here?"

Hagoromo took over in explaining, "Naruto was given one person to go back in time with to relive his life for the amusement of the powers that be. He chose you."

"Oh," was Neji's sole respone. He turned to Naruto, "why not Sasuke?"

"Crazy black flames," was Naruto's response, "he has a kid now. Would not like me taking him from that."

"I see," Neji responded, "what else has happened since I died? How did the war end?"

"Oh, glad you asked," Naruto said, slightly giddier than he had been before, "you want the short or the long version?"

Neji looked to Hagoromo. The Rinnegan was fully apparent in the old man's eyes. Neji wisely bowed.

"How long do we have in here, Venerable Sage?"

Hagoromo, not used to such respect after having spent so long with Naruto, was slightly surprised by the proper way of speech. He responded after his heart had finally restarted.

"We are in a void that can literally only exist due to the absence of time and space. You could spend millenia in here and have absolutely nothing change."

"I see," Neji pondered. He looked back at Naruto. He looked far too excited for a person being ripped from his old life for whatever reason.

"The short version."

Naruto, now pouting cause Neji refused his longer version, cleared his throat. He was getting the medium version for being a smartass.

"So basically, after you saved Hinata and I from the Juubi, the Shinobi Alliance decided that-"

"Hinata," Neji interrupted.

"Excuse me?" Naruto asked.

"I saved Hinata from the Juubi. You were a fortunate add on."

"I see," said Naruto slowly, before continuing, "anyway, after you died, it _somehow_ reminded me of what it was like to be a Shinobi, and that it meant we endure. We then formed a giant Kurama powered phoenix I think."

"What the actual fuck."

"Indeed," Hagoromo input.

"Yeah, so we ran through the Juubi tree. Were you there when the Juubi turned into a tree?"

"I wish I was. Probably wouldn't have been impaled by its spike things."

"So yeah, it turned into a tree. How crazy was that?"

"Sounds like you're making this up," Neji responded.

"I wish he was," Hagoromo stated, "continue."

"So that happened. Uh, I think the Hokages came back?"

Neji held up a hand, "you're telling this story out of order. I was there when that happened."

Naruto pouted, "well excuse me. This was like, seventeen years ago."

Neji gaped, "Se-seventeen years? How old are you?"

"I dunno," Naruto answered, "I wanna say thirty six."

"How do you not know how old you are?" Neji asked.

"Things kinda blend together when you're running an entire village and spearheading a United Shinobi Front."

Neji's jaw dropped even further, "Wait, you did it? You became Hokage?" Naruto beamed at this.

"Yup! Nanadaime Hokage himself! Aren't you proud?"

"Of course, Naruto!" the Hyuuga prodigy exclaimed. Putting aside his recently admitted accidental saving of the blonde boy's life, Neji still sincerely wished for the blonde's happiness and well being. "Seventh Hokage is ama- wait Seventh?"

Naruto nodded, "yes, Kakashi-sensei was before me."

"How exciting."

"Indeed," responded Naruto, "so anyway, Obito then became the jinchuuriki of the Ten-Tails, then kinda died with it after I used Talk no Jutsu on him but he didn't really die, then Madara came back to life after forcing Obito to use the same thing that Pein used to bring Konoha back to life on him. He then became the Ten Tails jinchuuriki."

"Wait, didn't Tsunade ban that Talk no Jutsu? Something about it being too powerful?" Naruto made a shushing sound.

"Anyway, Madara then absorbed the tree..."

"Wait, I thought the tree was the Juubi?"

"Listen Neji, everything gets a bit confusing here. Do you want the short version or not?" Naruto asked, clearly annoyed.

Neji wisely shut up.

"Anyway, he gets like really powerful and Sasuke and I almost die so Grampa Sage here-"

"Wait, what do you mean, almost die?"

"We almost die. Stop interrupting or so help me I will Talk no Jutsu you."

Neji once again shuts up. Its at this point Hagoromo begins to contemplate how powerful this jutsu is.

"Should I inform the gods of this ability? It seems much more fearsome than the name implies."

Neji deadpans, "I don't think even the gods could take such a forbidden and powerful technique from him."

"Grandpa Sage here then tells us that we're the incarnations of his sons, who were doomed to fight each other for all eternity because Godlike sibling rivalry transcends lifetimes."

Neji looked at the Sage for confirmation. When the Sage nodded, Neji could only sigh and gesture for Naruto to continue.

"We gain some of their powers, Sasuke the Sharinnegan and I the abilities of every single Tailed Beast."

Neji once again turned to the Sage. Not once did the Sage choose to interrupt so Neji was forced to take this as fact.

"Also I think I gained the ability to regrow certain body parts. I regrew Kakashi's sensei's eye when Madara took it and Bushy Brow Sensei's soul."

Neji at this point just decided to never turn away from the Sage. Seeing his straight face never once falter made the young Hyuuga wonder how good this man was at poker.

"So anyway, we start fighting and we get Madara to a standstill. It was now that that Black Zetsu freak did something and Madara turned into Kaguya, Grandpa Sage's mom. She teleported us to another dimension a couple times and she teleported Sasuke to another one completely. It took all of Sakura-chan's saved up chakra and I think Obito's last powers of his Kamui? I don't quite remember, but we got him back. Now this next part may seem unbelievable..."

"Sure, the next part." Neji commented.

"Right, so Kakashi sensei told me that shortly after we saved Sasuke, Obito died, but because he was really determined, he was able to loan Kakashi his Sharingan for a bit and Kakashi used to make a perfect Susanoo and protect us when we eventually sealed Kaguya away in another dimension."

Neji held up his hands to stop the story, "wait, hold on? Obito did what? I thought he was our enemy?"

"Talk no Jutsu," Naruto responded.

"Oh right."

Seeing Neji's immediate acceptance had finalized Hagoromo's decision to tell the gods of this technique.

"But he came back to give Kakashi his Sharingan? There's a limit to how far determination can go."

"You'd be surprised," Hagoromo cut in.

"So anyway, Grandpa Sage summoned us back, Sasuke and I fought, and eventually lost both our arms, before I finally, _finally_ pulled that stick out of his ass. He then settled down, roamed the Earth, had a kid with Sakura, I had two kids with Hinata, and we all lived happily ever after until this happened." It was here Naruto found a gentle fist at his throat. He poofed into nonexistence.

"Wait what?" Neji asked.

Hagoromo shared that sentiment.

"That was a... shadow clone?"

Hagoromo, who couldn't believe it, cursed before putting his hand on Neji's shoulder.

"I'll be back"

In his office, Naruto had momentarily stopped eating his instant ramen when the memories of his clone zipped back to him.

"They finally figured it out, huh?" The Orange Hokage then placed his hand on the intercom.

"Hey Shizune?"

"Yes. Naruto?" his lovely assistance who looked over the last two Kages answered.

"Next time I press this button, remind me of something?"

"Yes, Naruto?"

"Remind me that I almost got away with pranking the GOD of Shinobi," he answered, before Hagoromo's hand zipped out of the aether and dragged Naruto back into the timeless zone.

Naruto, now a kid again, laughed his ass off.

"Took you long enough."


	2. Chapter 2: Things Won't Get Less Random

Naruto awoke with a start. This was the second time in three hours that he would awaken to the sunrise hitting his face. Looking around, he could see he was somewhere in a forest, or at least near one, with the heavy foliage and tall trees.

"Ugh," the neo-boy grumbled, "where am I?"

Kurama grumbled in his gut, "You're in the past, idiot. Weren't you paying attention?"

Naruto scowled at his own stomach. He hit it for effect.

"That does absolutely nothing to me and you know it," the fox yipped. Turning over in his host's stomach, the fox then proceeded to stretch to make his point known.

"I know," Naruto replied, before standing up to get his bearings, "there aren't many ways for me to convey my annoyance to you though." It was around now that he noticed a tall enough tree. Crouching, the ex-Hokage managed to reach the top in one jump.

Landing comfortably on the branch at the very top, Naruto was able to see for very far around him. From what he could see, he seemed to be in his hometown, but with notable differences.

"It feels weird, looking at that mountain without my face on it."

" **Never mind the entire city, complete with skyscrapers and cars, that's missing from the top.** "

Naruto scowled a bit, "Why are you speaking so deeply now? If I could imagine your voice in text, it would be in bold."

Kyuubi shrugged, " **I just felt like distinguishing myself now that I'm back in time. This was how I talked to you originally. Nostalgia's sake.** "

"I see," Naruto replied, still looking out over his old hometown, "anyway, yeah, all that stuff is gone and missing too. It's just… I was proud of that face, you know? It was nice. Validated all my struggles up till that point."

" **Yeah, I know. Well, if you could do it once, you could do it again, can't you? Or are you afraid?** "

Naruto shook his head vigorously. "No, of course not."

" **Or do you think that the gods were right? That you just got lucky all those times?** "

Shaking his head again, Naruto smirked, "Heck no. Everything I've done, everything I've accomplished. It was all me. I know that for sure."

" **So there's nothing to worry about. Besides,** **you have me this time. I could probably solo everyone here if you let me out** "

"You probably cou- wait. Why are you asking? You haven't been sealed for years. You can leave at any time."

" **Oh right** ," the fox replied, " **one sec.** "

A puff of smoke appeared next to Naruto on the tree branch. When it cleared, a boy strikingly similar to Naruto, but with fox ears and a big, bushy orange tail appeared. Instead of Naruto's orange jumpsuit however, he was in an orange dress shirt and black dress pants.

Upon appearance, the Kyuubi looked at himself in disgust, " **Why the fuck am I a kid**."

Naruto looked at the fox. Upon seeing his short stature he shrugged, not really caring. He turned back to the village.

Kyuubi was not as uncaring, " **Brat. Why. The FUCK. Am I a kid?** "

"How the hell should I know, Kurama? Your age probably reverted when I did. You DO have to run your chakra through my body before its released."

" **I could choose my human form before!** " the fox screamed. He poked at his chubby cheeks. " **I don't want to be doomed to look like YOU. The horror**."

Naruto, who was about to return fire, decided to look at himself first. He was dressed in a tacky full orange and blue jumpsuit that had honestly seen better days. It was ripped and tattered all over, including places that quite honestly had no reason to have a hole. Lifting his shirt, the boy saw that his body, while not necessarily bony, was stringy and thin. Almost like he had not eaten much over the weeks. There were quite a lot of bruises on him, as well as the scars he was born with on his baby fat cheeks.

He, well, he didn't look _bad_ , but unless you were into specifically him he wasn't going to turn any heads.

At least Kurama had those ears and better clothes.

Deciding not to retort on something that he honestly agreed on, Naruto just turned back to the village. It wasn't exactly _his_ anymore, but, well. It was still home.

" **Not gonna respond, brat?** " Kyuubi asked.

Naruto shook his head, "Not really. I just want to enjoy this. Isn't it great?" Naruto asked, gesturing his hand out over the city, "this is the city before it was destroyed. Everyone here… they were still innocent. So many people have no idea what terrible things are about to happen to them. How much things are about to change. How many of them are about to die. Right now, they're all still alive. They're all still _happy_.

Kyuubi, now seeing Naruto wasn't up for a round, just stared out over the village at well. He supposed the man-turned-kid was right. There was something beautiful about the things that he said. The inherent innocence that accompanied their trip back in time. The peace that hung in the air like a nice little blanket after to his attack had a presence that only a madman wouldn't miss.

He, being a chakra monster of extreme malevolence, was one of those madmen.

" **We should fuck with them. We should fuck with them hard.** "

Naruto took a deep breath. Holding it in for a second, the boy released a long and heavy sigh.

"Yeah, you're right."

And with that, the ex-Hokage jumped off the tree and landed to the ground. The fox smiled in Naruto's replica body, before jumping off after him.

Today was going to be a good day.

 _Several hours later_

Iruka settled into his seat with a sigh. Today was going to be a long day. Looking over his class, each and every one of his students had a look of apprehension on their faces. Their nervous energy quite literally permeated the air. Iruka smiled a bit, slightly amused with their situation. They had every right to be anxious today.

Today was the day of the Genin Exams.

Every student in class could be seen anxiously studying notes and practicing hand signs to commit them to memory. Those who weren't were doing various things to calm their nerves, such as playing with yo-yos and fiddling with their fingers. Out of the whole class, only two students could be seen not playing along with the day's hype. One Shikamaru Nara, who was currently asleep; and one Naruto Uzumaki, who was staring straight at him with a megawatt smile.

To be completely honest, neither of those boys had much reason to be taking this exam so lightly, but who was he to judge? He just hoped Naruto had gotten the clone jutsu down. Otherwise this would be a third failure.

Over with Naruto, things were going very differently.

"Its so weird seeing everyone so young again," Naruto thought, his thoughts going through his and Kyuubi's mental link.

" **I know. Some of these young'uns I could've sworn I'd eaten** ," Kyuubi responded, his body walking around town under a henge.

Naruto's smile faltered a bit, "I would appreciate you not trying to dampen my mood."

" **And** _ **I**_ **would appreciate you not trying to dampen my food** ," Kyuubi retorted. Upon seeing a human that looked particularly delicious, Kurama smiled, some teeth showing through his poorly made henge. " **Hey brat, do you think they would notice if I just ate one of them? Akamichis are actually really delicious.** "

Naruto pinched the bridge of his nose, "yes. Yes I do think they'd notice. Why the hell are you asking me this? Did I ever let you eat anyone back in our time?"

" **Yes. Yes you did. I was actually supposed to eat some bandits today and honestly this whole 'sent back in time thing' really ground on my nerves. I was really looking forward to it**."

Naruto sighed, "then take it up with your Sage Grandpa. I don't have time for this."

" **Which brings up another good point. Why exactly are you playing along with this mockery of the gods? I would've thought that you would have already put a Rasengan through this city by now, just to spite their plans.** "

Naruto, who had just taken a paper for the written part of the exam, stopped and started to stare off into space.

"That's… actually not a bad idea. I might do that once a find a good enough excuse." The boy then took out a pencil; an extra he stole from Sasuke when he wasn't looking. "But for right now, there are certain things that I would rather do over and surprise everyone with. Doing the Genin Exams the right way would be the first one. If I recall correctly, I failed this one as well."

" **Mmf, what was that, brat?** "

"You're eating someone, aren't you?"

Kyuubi gulped, before wiping his mouth, " **No one you'll miss** "

"I see," Naruto responded, not caring too much either way. He looked down at his paper, preparing to ace it, when the very first question made his eyes bulge out.

"Okay, what the fuck?"

Kyuubi, now relaxing in the alley after his meal, perked up, " **what?** "

"These questions," the ex-Hokage responded, "they're too hard!"

" **Or maybe you're too dumb** "

"Damn it Kyuubi, now's not the time! I _know_ these questions weren't on the test the first time around. Iruka-sensei and I did a mock retake of the test I took when I finally graduated the day after I became Hokage! I passed it with a B! This isn't the same test!"

Kyuubi stopped listening in favor of laughing. The Seventh Hokage of the Hidden Leaf Village did average on a child's test.

"You can laugh all you want, furball. At least I don't cough up hair after washing myself."

" **At least I wash myself, meat bag**."

"I do wash myself, blood for brains, Hinata won't let me skip out."

" **That you have to penalized on it by your wife proves your integrity as a person** ," responded Kyuubi, " **how is your meat bag of a wife anyway? I rather liked her**."

Naruto, who had by now realized that his test was different from everyone else's sighed, "I don't know. I didn't bother to check," he then raised his hand, "Iruka-sensei? I think my test is a little funny."

Iruka, who had been watching over the class to prevent cheating, looked over at Naruto. With a slight scowl, he made his way over to the blond.

"That's odd. There shouldn't even _be_ another version of a test."

When Iruka reached the test, he picked up the paper expecting something wrong. After three seconds of looking at the paper, he turned it over several times, clearly confused.

"This isn't funny, Naruto."

"Excuse me?" Naruto asked.

" **Excuse him?** " parroted Kurama.

"I said this isn't funny. Your test is the same as everyone else's. Get to work," the chunin repeated, before setting the paper down.

" **Looks like you are stupid** ," the Kyuubi restated. He had started to pick the villager out of his teeth.

"Bullshit and you know it. Come disperse this genjutsu so I can do this test."

Kurama blinked, " **Since when could I fucking do that?** "

Naruto blinked, "what do you mean? Since forever!"

" **I can't fucking do that**."

"Then how the hell have I been able to dispel genjutsu?" To answer this, the Kyuubi shrugged. Naruto felt it somehow, "then what?"

" **Maybe you just have too much chakra**."

"How the hell does that even compute?"

" **Listen, I don't know, human. I don't know how your puny human techniques work, okay? I just know that I have a shit ton of chakra and genjutsus have NEVER worked on me**."

"That's bullshit! What about when you attacked the village when I was born?"

Kyuubi chuckled, " **Okay, let's be fair here. Do you REALLY think it'd take that much convincing to get me to burn this hovel to the ground**?"

Naruto thought about it. He supposed that it wouldn't take much convincing to get HIM to burn it to the ground and he lived there.

" **Second, I was affected by the Sharingan. You know? That thing that allows people to cut mountains and summon unquenchable, never ending fire as dark as the blackest night? The thing that allows people to hop dimensions? The thing that evolves into something that can SUMMON METEORS?** "

"Okay, I get it," Naruto thought, trying to assuage the offended demon. He started channeling chakra through the paper. When it didn't dispel anything, he sighed, and decided to just try to work out the problems. Even if he failed this, if he passed the others he'd still do fine enough.

" **Maybe your teacher is sabotaging you**."

Naruto shook his head, "impossible. Iruka sensei is my friend."

" **The gods did say they would actively fuck with you in order to keep things on track** ," Kyuubi reminded him. He had taken to walking around the street to pickpocket a few items.

"I doubt they would change Iruka-sensei though. That was a very core part of my life. Changing it would change so many things."

" **Then maybe they changed the test. If its not a genjutsu and your teacher is the same, then maybe they changed the test so you would definitely fail it**."

Naruto pondered that. Over the course of the conversation he had accepted that there was no way in hell for him to answer any of these questions. "You might be right."

" **Of course I'm right. Do you know who I am**?"

Naruto chuckled, "my favorite fuzzball?"

" **You're damn fucking right, I am** ," Kyuubi stated with pride.

Naruto had now flipped his page to start drawing on the back, "so the gods are intent on making me fail. I probably can't change it now that we're so far in."

" **You can shove a Giant Rasengan through the class**."

Naruto shook his head, "no, I'd still fail and they'd flip it so I'd still do the Mizuki thing."

" **Was that when that asshole teacher told you about me**?"

Naruto nodded, "Yeah. He called you a bastard a couple times. It was great."

The Kyuubi lit up, " **That's just… that's just great. Can I eat him?** "

"Isn't that the entire reason you're stealing stuff?" Naruto then picked up the paper to appreciate his drawing. "Would you have cared what I said either way?"

" **Yes and no, meat bag. In that order** ," the Kyuubi then stopped where he was walking, " **I never was able to find my way around these parts. Which way do I go to reach that ramen shop you love**?"

Naruto, who had now started to color in his drawing, stopped and glared out the window, "if you burn down Ichiraku's I will **end you**."

Kurama, who feared very little and roared in the face of a monster whose eye dwarfed his entire body, stopped and chose his words very carefully, " **I** _ **meant**_ **, where in the forest did you encounter Mizuki when he tricked you**?"

"East of the village, past the 47th Training Ground."

" **Thank you** "

"You're welcome."

Even Later On

"Why the hell did I only learn Shadow Clone from this?" Naruto asked, looking through the Forbidden Scroll.

" **You were stupid back then** ," Kyuubi responded, " **you're stupid now**."

Naruto had by now looked further down. Upon seeing a familiar technique he cocked his head, "so that's where Orochimaru got that Reanimation Technique from," he scowled, "how the hell did Orochimaru get his hands on this?"

The Kyuubi, who was now setting up a campfire, turned to look at his host, " **he's confirmed a shifty freak. He probably pilfered it when no one was looking**."

"People are always looking. They hire people to specifically look at it."

" **They have to blink, human. He probably got it then. That's when you got it**."

"Fair enough. What's this?" Naruto asked, looking over a specific technique.

Kyuubi looked at it over the blond's shoulder, " **I think it makes you shoot lasers from your eyes**."

Naruto lit up, "that's sweet! Why is it forbidden?"

" **It says here that it then burns your eyes from their sockets**."

"Eh, I'll grow em back. What else is on here?"

Kurama had already started to look down the page, " **what about this one? It makes all females in a 100 mile radius lust after you**."

Naruto looked at it carefully. After reading it he shook his head.

"Nah. I only want Hinata. Everyone else is kind of a drag. Besides, that would probably drag Granny Tsunade along and that's not what I need."

" **Save it anyway. Your pervert teacher would enjoy it**."

Naruto deadpanned, "which one? Kakashi, Yamato or..."

The blond dropped the scroll.

"Jiraiya. Kyuubi, Jiraiya… he's..."

" **Alive here, yes. Fascinating, isn't it**?"

Tears almost came unbidden to his eyes, "I'm _not_ letting him die again. The gods be damned."

Kyuubi shrugged, heading back over to his impromptu camp site.

" **It doesn't matter either way. He'll be gone when you're replaced back in your original timeline.** "

Naruto shrugged, "it doesn't matter either way. I just don't want to see him die again."

" **Fair enough. Hey, the asshole teacher is on his way. The good one is slightly behind him**."

Naruto frowned. "That's not right. Iruka was supposed to be here first."

" **The gods are probably intervening again** ," he then smirked, " **too bad things are about to change regardless**."

Staring into the scroll, Naruto quickly memorized the laser eyes for future use before rolling it up and putting it into his backpack.

"Its showtime, Kurama."

" **I think you mean, 'dinner time', meat bag**."

Shortly after Kurama said that, Mizuki landed into the middle of the forest clearing. If he was surprised that there were two Narutos, one being decidedly more foxy than the other, and that said foxy Naruto was tending to a campsite and looking at him while licking his lips hungrily, he certainly didn't show it.

Though, to be honest, Naruto probably wouldn't have reacted to such a bizarre scene either.

"I see you got the scroll, demon brat."

Kurama piped up, " **excuse me, human.** _ **I'm**_ **the demon around these parts. Don't you dare compare my magnificence to a dunce like he**."

Mizuki ignored him. "Now just hand it over. I'll graduate you on the spot."

Naruto who was looking back and forth between his biju and his old teacher, answered slightly confused.

"Do you… do you not see that?"

"It doesn't concern me," Mizuki replied.

Naruto looked back at Kyuubi. He was placing salt in a cauldron.

"I really think it does."

Mizuki had started to get fed up. He didn't have much time. He had to get the scroll and head over to Orochimaru before he was caught by the Konoha officials who were almost definitely looking for him.

"I don't have _time_ for this, brat. Just hand it over."

Naruto, who was now clutching the scroll, was just extremely perplexed, "is this the doing of the gods as well? Is he stuck on the same actions as before?"

" **Maybe** ," responded Kurama, " **your less annoying teacher is still as far away as before. I'm guessing they're waiting for something**."

"Who are you talking to, brat? Is it the demon you have inside of you?" Incidentally, he was.

"What are you talking about?" Naruto asked Kurama. Mizuki thought he was talking to him and continued.

"You mean you don't know, demon brat? Then allow me to tell you. You, Uzumaki Naruto, are no normal child. Have you never noticed the stares? Why no one would talk to you or let you in on their little, pathetic reindeer games? Its because you, child, are actually so much more horrid that you look."

Naruto took personal offense to that last part. He filed it away for later.

Mizuki continued, "You, you disgusting little brat, are actually the terrible _Kyuubi no Yoko_ that destroyed the Village those years ago. YOU are the being that caused us so much death and destruction! YOU'RE the one to blame for the sadness that has plagued us all!"

" **Again, that was me. All me**."

"And Obito," Naruto clarified.

" **Details** "

"So what do you have to say for that? Huh, demon brat? I bet you're feeling broken and betrayed!" Mizuki continued.

"Not really. I already knew all of that."

Mizuki blinked. "What?"

"I said I already knew that."

Mizuki blinked again, "Oh. Uh, okay. Then, I guess I'll just kill you now?"

"No you won't!" a voice came from the forest. Immediately Iruka jumped from the treeline and in front of the young orange ninja. He was promptly knocked out by said orange ninja.

" **Oh, that's where he was. I guess he was just supposed to wait until Mizuki spilled the beans. It might also be why he's trying so hard to ignore me. Sucks for him** ," Kyuubi stated, adding field poppies to the soup.

"Aren't those poisonous?" Naruto asked while carrying Iruka over to a safer place.

" **Yes** " was Kyuubi's reply.

"Then why are you eating them?"

" **Cause its a good thing I don't have organs or a respiratory system or anything inside me at all to be affected by the poison. I'm going to abuse that power**."

The blond Hokage stared at his foxy counterpart, "you don't have organs?"

The fox stared back, " **I'm a being made of pure, unbridled, malevolent chakra. You tell me about what organs you think I would have**."

"Fair enough," replied the orange boy. He turned and stepped back in front of his traitorous teacher, "you're still here?"

Mizuki, who had now watched the whole exchange, was certifiably flabbergasted.

"I'm… I'm pretty sure you weren't supposed to do that."

Naruto glared at him, "you're confused at that and not at the demonic me who has been sizing you up since you stepped into this clearing?"

Mizuki shrugged, "I'm a simple man. I ignore that which I don't understand."

" **Well prepare to be completely mindfucked, cause nothing inside my stomach makes sense. Believe me, I've been there,** " Kyuubi replied. In a flash of orange the fox boy reappeared behind the chunin. Before he could say anything the Kyuubi had grasped the man in two giant chakra claws. Unable to move, the man could do nothing but squirm in the superior being's grasp.

"W-what? Let me go!"

" **Well, if that's what you want** ," Kyuubi replied. With a smirk, the chakra hands held the chunin higher in the air. After shifting his jaw a few times, the fox boy opened and expanded his jaw to an almost disgusting-

"No, that's pretty disgusting," Naruto interrupted, "wait, did I just interrupt the narrator?"

-to a disgusting amount. He then dropped the terrified man in his mouth, swallowing him whole.

" **Delicious** ," the Kyuubi remarked, " **couldn't have made it any other way. Traitors are just wonderful to eat**."

Naruto, who was more than a little scarred, decided to comment, "that may have been the most terrifying thing I'd ever seen and I've seen Kakashi wear Gai's jumpsuit for his birthday.

The Kyuubi shrugged, " **you'll get over it**."

"No, I don't think I will." The Kyuubi shrugged. He decided he didn't care.

Naruto then looked at the boiling pot that was sitting over the campfire.

"Wait, if you were always going to eat him whole, why did you need the stew?" he asked.

" **Oh, that. Right** ," Kurama remembered. He walked over to the pot, and, taking it in a giant chakra hand, started to ingest the contents.

Naruto could swear he could hear pained screams.

After a while, Kurama finished the pot. Setting it down, the chakra being licked his lips, appreciating his own food.

" **Delicious**."

Naruto was confused, "what was the point of that?"

" **To kill the guy I just ate**."

"Why?"

" **Cause I've eaten people whole before. It didn't turn out well.** "

"Then why didn't you just chew him?"

" **It takes away the pure awesome-ness of eating him whole**."

Naruto sighed, before looking over at his other sensei. He made his way over to him and shook him slightly by the shoulder.

"You probably shouldn't be here when I wake him up."

" **Eh** ," replied the Kyuubi, before making a handsign. The fox disappeared in a shunshin.

" **I'll return to your gut when I'm done digesting this slowly dying maggot. Poppy poison is just great. I can hear him moan in agony.** "

"You get to that pal."

It was around now that Iruka had started to awaken.

"Huh, where am I? What's going on?"

Naruto smiled, "you saved me from Mizuki, sensei! Thank you!"

Iruka rubbed his head, "Are you sure? I could've sworn something knocked me out as soon as I got here. In fact, if I didn't know any better, I would've said that YOU-"

Naruto cut him off, "no no no. You saved me Iruka sensei! If it weren't for you we would've both died out here! Thank you for standing up for me and assuring me that I'm not the filthy beast inside of me."

" **I'm outside of you now, ninja brat. If I knew where Hinata lived I would eat her whole family for that**."

"As long as you leave Hinata herself I couldn't care less."

Iruka by now was just confused, "Well, that does sound like something I planned on doing. But… I don't remember any of it."

Naruto smiled, "I know. Just, give me my headband?"

"Oh right," Iruka remarked, "close your eyes."

Naruto, never being able to forget this moment, did as he was told. He could hear the shuffling of cloth and the slight clink of metal as Iruka removed his own headband to be placed on Naruto's head. Feeling pride rush all around him, Naruto couldn't repress the smile that was on his face.

"Okay, you can open your eyes now," Iruka said. Naruto could hear the mirth in his voice. Slowly, as to savor the moment, Naruto opened his eyes. Iruka no longer had his headband on, and instead held Naruto's goggles in his hands. Looking up at his forehead, Naruto could see the Leaf symbol shining in the morning sun that was now rising once again.

"Congratulations, Naruto. You are now officially a member of Konohagakure's Ninja Force. I'm so proud."

Naruto's smile now stretched across his face. No longer able to contain his joy, even though this was the second time this was happening, the boy tackled his mentor, the same man he saw as sort of a father. Iruka, who was now no longer able to fend off the joyous energy just radiating off the boy, hugged him back, a smile on his face as well.

"Thank you Iruka-sensei!"

"No problem Naruto."

" **Congrats B student** ," Kyuubi remarked. Naruto mentally flipped him off. How? Fuck if I know.

After a short while, Iruka spoke up again, "Now, lets get some ramen before we go head back to Sandaime-sama, okay?" Naruto nodded. He didn't think there was a time he was ever happier than he was now.

" **What about when you and your wife did that** -"

He didn't think there was a time in this timeline where he was ever happier than he was now.

" **Oh** "

Halfway to the village, with Naruto more or less carrying the still dazed Iruka, the teacher decided to speak up again.

"Are you absolutely sure what you said had happened? Cause I could've sworn that-"

"Do you want me to knock you out again or not, Iruka-sensei?"

Iruka shut up and just kept walking to the ramen stand.


	3. Chapter 3: So Random It Is Now Expecting

_**I don't even know what I'm doing anymore. This story just scrolls through random moments so much that when I found myself writing serious things I surprised even myself. Here's the next chapter, with random serious moments mixed in**_

* * *

Naruto stared ahead of him, his body posture rigid and his glare resolute. Unflinching, the boy kept his gaze forward, refusing to blink or even move, for fear that the man in front of him might disappear.

The man standing across from him, for his part, tried his best to return the gesture. Instead of his glare being intense however, it was little more than lazy, bordering on sleepy.

Truly Kakashi had no idea what was going on, but he was sure that it wasn't anything he wanted to do with.

Now somewhere in the back of the Jonin's head he could realize that the child in front of him -dressed in all orange with whisker marks on his cheeks- could easily be assumed as one of his "students." There were probably about two to three people in all of the Hidden Leaf Village who wore orange, and judging from recent reports about the boy's newly gained technique, almost all of those people were probably the child as well.

This being said the one eyed man could not for the life of him figure out _why_ exactly said student was here. Kakashi was currently standing at the Memorial Site, a place where no student Naruto's age had any need to be, trying his best to pay respects to his fallen teammates and sensei: The Fourth Hokage of The Village Hidden in the Leaves.

Come to think of it, the boy looked eerily like the Fourth. Maybe his son? Almost definitely. Huh, look at that.

Anyway, he was trying his best to pay his respects: a feat he did religiously and only when someone important needed his time elsewhere. The penance for their deaths fell heavily on his heart, and he damn sure couldn't bear the weight of such guilt himself. Therefore he would grieve for them _for other people as well_ and consider the hours, sometimes even days, of their lives he wasted as a small payment.

It was the least he could do.

So with this in mind the ninja decided to be only two hours late to pick up his cute little prospective students. Unfortunately one of them seemed to have come to him. Early, at that. It was after several long moments more -in which he hoped the kid would leave- that Kakashi decided to break the silence that the young ninja brought with him.

"So what can I do for you?" Kakashi drawled, his hand starting to reach for the orange book that he had in a pocket near his thigh. It was getting to the point where he was pretty sure he was more known for it than the Sharingan under his headband.

Kakashi shrugged and pulled it out anyway. So be it. There were worse monikers.

The rather small boy responded to his question with a chuckle. Looking left and right for reasons the jonin couldn't fathom (he had followed the action with his own eye faster than most would perceive) the small genin prospect simply proceeded to stretch his hands over his head. Nothing really out of the ordinary. No, the words he said next were what toppled the man.

"Its not your fault," the boy remarked.

Kakashi raised his eyebrow, "excuse me?"

"Its not your fault," the boy repeated, an almost bored expression on his face, "the death of your teammate, Obito; and your teammate, Rin. Their deaths aren't your fault."

Kakashi wasn't sure he heard the boy right. Unless he was going crazy, there was absolutely no way the boy could have known that kind of information. That or he was going deaf. He decided he was going deaf. He stuck his pinky in his ear to make sure they were clean. Deciding they were, he turned back to the boy, who was now stretching before him.

"Excuse me?" the man asked again.

Naruto rolled his eyes.

"I SAID," the boy exclaimed. His voice was very audibly annoyed, "The death of your teammate Obito under that terrible cave-in at the hands of various enemy ninja which resulted in you having to inherit his Sharingan, as well as the subsequent death of your teammate Rin Nohara's death at your own hand," literally, Naruto left out, "is not your fault. It was out of your hands. You did all that you could."

Kakashi blinked. Okay, so he _had_ heard right. It didn't explain how the kid knew what he did, unless…

Naruto watched as Kakashi's face scrolled from surprised, to incredulous, to downright furious. The orange book his teacher frequented snapped shut with a very audible "snap". Any amount of mirth the man once had at seeing him before had dropped immediately, and with the hand he had been using to hold his smut book, the man slowly reached for his headband. He was likely to prepare his famed ocular power.

And it was for this very reason that Naruto smiled.

"I don't know who you are or who hired you," Kakashi said, a hint of steel in his voice, "but your decision to confront me directly and reveal such information was a terrible decision on your part." It was at this time that Kakashi had just lifted his headband, and it was at this time that Naruto had finally gotten what he wanted.

You see, being best friends and rivals with a person who owned not one, but _two_ legendary and powerful bloodline limits made friendly bouts extremely difficult. While Naruto was not in any way weak, when fighting against someone who could not only fight on par with him, but tiptoe through different dimensions as well as summon meteors, one learned that a trump card was something that needed to be in effect.

If not only to win those friendly bouts.

This in mind, Naruto had found a way to counter not only the Sharingan, but the Rinnegan years before his jump through time. Not only did this method work, but it worked on eyes much stronger and advanced than the one in front of him. Crossing his fingers, the boy did the one technique that he knew to work on even the mightiest of gods.

"Harem No Jutsu!" Naruto screamed.

And his scarecrow teacher, Sharingan blazing in the heat of fury, was forced to stare down the multiple bombshell women in front of him with all the intensity and focus of a man determined to take apart a traitor. He had dove into a charge the instant his eye was unveiled, only for the blonde to be enveloped in smoke and replaced by this… horde… of woman an instant later. His eye, completely unbidden, darted over and traced every inch and curve and the wall of feminine perfection before him. With this all beautifully committed to memory, Kakashi couldn't even close his eyes to rid himself of the blood filled knockout coming, because his Sharingan had already memorized and readily supplied the images to his mind's eye.

Kakashi was knocked out on sight, which left Naruto free to do with him as he pleased.

The blonde boy smiled.

* * *

 _Later_

Naruto trudged on through the streets of Konoha, his sensei lobbed haphazardly over his back and his eyes staring straight forward. Given the large gap between their ranks, with Naruto being barely a Genin and Kakashi being an experienced Jonin, not a single person batted an eye. They all assumed that everything was okay as there was no way Naruto could hurt the silver haired man. About halfway to the acadamy, Kyuubi decided to make himself known.

" **So, did you really think it was wise to tell all those things to your sensei?** " Kurama mused from his lounge inside Naruto, " **he might catch onto the fact we're not from this time**."

At this Naruto shrugged, "so?"

Kurama raised an eyebrow, " **what do you mean, 'so'**?"

"I mean, 'so'. There is no reason for me to fear of them knowing. We never tried to hide anything at all in the first place. If they ever do find out about what we really are, great, we get to sway from the path and fuck with the higher beings that dropped us here. Chances are however that whatever I do will instantly have damage control run and nothing will leave any lasting effect whatsoever. Case in point-"

Naruto lobbed a kunai straight between the eyes of a passing man. He continued with Kakashi in tow as if nothing happened.

" **Damn kid, that's harsh** ," Kyuubi muttered.

"You've EATEN people since we've gotten here!" Naruto yelled.

" **Yeah, but that's EXPECTED of me!** " the fox retorted, " **YOU are Mister Goody Stand With My Friends! I didn't expect it in you**."

Naruto shrugged, a habit he seemed to be doing a lot lately. This habit was made even harder with Kakashi taking up one half of his shoulders, but he managed. "Eh, being in a timeless wonder zone has dulled my ethics a bit. Sue me."

" **How did you even find out about this?** " Kyuubi asked. He didn't make note of it, but in the few meters Naruto had managed to drag Kakashi, the man with the kunai in his head had been healed and set back to work as if nothing happened. Without turning the future Hokage placed another kunai through his ear. It buried up to the handle and went out the other side. The man promptly collapsed.

"I'd gotten bored. I never missed my paperwork as Hokage, but at least it gave me something to do when I ran out. If not that I could punish Bolt or snuggle Himawari. Worst case scenario I could go to Hinata and SHE could-"

Kyuubi stopped him right there, " **Nope. Don't need to know.** "

Naruto looked confused, "why? She could ask Sakura to point me to where Sasuke was so we could spar."

Kyuubi stared, " **figures the only reason you would** **get a mate would be to get easier access to the boy.** "

Naruto nodded, ignoring whatever implications the Kyuubi meant.

"My point is, there is no reason for us to fear anything because absolutely nothing is permanent."

Kyuubi scrunched up his face in confusion. Despite the fox being a rather large beast of admitted violence and hatred it sorta looked cute. " **You sure? I'm pretty sure Mizuki is fully dead.** "

Naruto stopped, pondering the circumstance. After a minute of blocking traffic he continued walking.

"I'm sure he'll be fine."

It took another ten minutes, but the duo of student and unconscious teacher made their way to the academy. Naruto was short several kunai and shuriken, but he figured since he was no longer bored, everything worked out. After kicking in the door, Naruto walked in rather happily, before dumping his future teacher in a corner. This brought more than a few stares from the students sitting inside, as well as a freshly recovered Iruka, but if Naruto noticed he didn't show it. Swiftly, he made his way to the back of the class and sat down next to a flustered Hinata Hyuuga.

"Sup sweet cheeks?" Naruto flirted, trying to make his prepubescent voice as husky as possible. He failed utterly. This being the case, Hinata still could barely handle being in the same room as the orange wearing boy, so to have him not only in such close proximity but TALKING to her was enough to knock her out. Naruto fixed her so that she wouldn't sprain her neck.

"I missed that," Naruto said with a sigh, putting his head on the desk in order to appreciate how cute his wife used to be. Not cute in an adult way though. Cute in a puppy way. "Why I was so fixated on Sakura back then puzzles me even now."

Kyuubi rumbled, " **I can see why you hadn't noticed her. She was so pathetically** _ **weak**_ **back then. This is too far of a cry from the beast of a woman she became in the future. Bah**."

Naruto chuckled, "does the big bad Kyuubi miss little old Mrs. Uzumaki?"

" **I wouldn't go so far as to say 'miss'. I miss no one but maybe the Old Man. No, I miss the things she did. First off, she kept your orange wearing figure clean. It shouldn't take me threatening you with a Bijuu Bomb to get you to touch your shower faucet**."

"I almost didn't even do it then. I needed something to fight."

" **She kept you in line. Not one day from her you've started killing civilians**."

"To be fair, I'm a ninja. It's in my job description. Even if it wasn't, I'd probably do it anyway since they can't actually die."

" **I think you charged up chakra for as much as you could and threw it in a line. It went straight through the Hokage Mountain**."

"Oh right," Naruto said, his eyes opening. At some point he had started to fall asleep. "I wonder where that kunai is now."

* * *

Elsewhere, a multi-Bijuu powered kunai pierced the head of Hidan, the Jashin Priest. It's work done here, the blade continued unabated.

Its thirst for blood would not be sated here today.

* * *

"I bet it didn't even hit anything yet," Naruto mused. Kyuubi rolled his eyes at how easy his charge was taking this.

" **There are easier ways to fuck with the gods, child**."

"True," the Uzumaki answered, "but I enjoy the sweeter things in life."

* * *

 _Even Later  
_

The three students; Sasuke, Naruto, and Sakura, sat on a bench on the roof of their Academy. In front of them stood a slightly flustered Kakashi. He was tired and his head hurt something fierce, but there he was. Completely on time.

"And you're sure that's what happened?" the man asked the orange ninja sitting before him.

"Definitely," Naruto answered, his smile bright enough to power generators, "I found you in the middle of the forest, knocked out with a huge smile on your face. You looked peaceful, so I wanted to put you in a place where I get my best sleep. The answer to that being, of course, the Academy classroom. That you just so happened to be our Jonin teacher was coincidental."

"I see," the scarecrow responded. "Very well, let's go over our introductions, shall we?" The man continued. He was tempted to reach into his pouch to get his book, but recent _odd_ blackouts made him decide to rethink that plan.

He may need to lay off the stuff if it was going to make him randomly black out like that.

"Uh, sensei? How should we do this?" the pink haired girl asked after some time. The Jonin could hear the trepidation in her voice, but decided not to comment on it. He would beat her doubt out of her head if she ever became his student.

"Well, I'll go first," Kakashi answered. "My name is Kakashi Hatake. I have many interests, and just as many hobbies. I don't fear a lot of things, at least, I don't remember. I don't have a lot of goals left, but I don't think I regret anything either. That's about it for me. What about you guys?"

Sasuke and Sakura stared at the man. All they really knew about the man was his name. Upon seeing that they weren't going to go anywhere with this, Kakashi spoke up for them.

"I think we'll start with you, pink hair. What's up with you?"

"Oh… Oh!" Sakura eeped, not expecting to be put on the spot. After clearing her throat and looking lovingly to her left -Sasuke- and disdainfully to her right -Naruto- the girl finally responded.

"I… am interested in a certain boy," the kunoichi started, before sneaking a glance at Sasuke, "and my hobby is reading books on becoming a better ninja. I think I'm afraid of making my parents disappointed in me, though they say that they would never be and that just getting this far would already be more than they expected. My goal is to be the wife of a certain someone," this comment was meant with a glance to her left again, which served little more than to annoy the Uchiha, "and to avoid another certain someone," with which she looked right. This glance was met with another smile, which put off Sakura's bad intentions. It was hard to keep a bad mood under such a genuine smile.

And to Naruto, it was of course a genuine smile. He was intensely and eternally grateful for the friends he had made throughout his life. Just because they were 13 again and could no longer remember anything of their times together meant nothing. He was happy to see them. Of course, none of this meant anything in the end. Sakura couldn't continue to berate the boy when such joy was being directed at her.

"and my regret..." Sakura continued after the effects of the smile wore off. She paused for a moment, as if considering what her answer would be before finally answering a minute later.

"I regret not being able to stop some of the atrocious things that happened in Konohagakure."

At this statement, both Naruto and Sasuke turned their heads.

Kakashi raised his eyebrow.

"Oh really?" Kakashi stated, his curiosity peaked, "Atrocious things? Like what? We're a ninja village you know. Atrocities are our trade."

At that, Sakura shook her head. "I-I know that we as… as ninja… are supposed to do some less that admirable things. We might k-kill people and stuff, and it is definitely in the job description, but some of the things that happened here don't deserve to be visited upon anyone. Things like the Kyuubi attack and the Uchiha Massacre. If I were born a little earlier, or had been a little stronger, I would have been able to do something… _anything…_ to stop them. It's not fair. So many lives were lost and futures destroyed. What makes it worse is that both of these events happened one after the other. I regret not being able to help."

Naruto blinked. "Well, that's new," Naruto thought.

" **Did that not happen?** "

"No, she kinda just ragged on me and drooled on Sasuke," Naruto thought about it for a second, "so nothing new really."

" **Maybe she just never got around to saying what she really felt last time. Admit it, if you had a choice between declaring your love for Hinata to her or saying your dreams which would you choose with a limited time slot?** "

Naruto chuckled, "is that even a question? Both. 'I love you Hinata cause I'll be Hokage dattebayo!'"

Kyuubi just smirked.

"And what about you, Mr. Energetic?" Kakashi continued, gesturing to the Uchiha. Said Uchiha, with his hands folded and his chin resting upon them, simply glared up at his teacher.

"I don't really care about any of those things you said. I only have one goal, and that's to-"

"Drone on and one about being sad. Sheesh, we get it. Life sucks. Move on," Naruto interrupted, his hands behind his head now. Kicking up his feet, the blonde boy laid back to start cloud watching.

"Excuse me?" Sasuke asked, surprise taking the seat for now. Surely his deep seated anger would return later. Right now questions needed to be answered.

"Listen," Naruto started. He looked up, eyes roaming the sky, "I know life is hard for you. Believe me, it hasn't been the best for me either."

" **In this life and the last**."

"But sitting around and wallowing about it isn't going to help anything." The boy then took a deep breath, closing his eyes once more and taking in the intricacies of life. Upon reopening them, he continued to stare at the clouds, though with a renewed vigor. "Get stronger, get faster, do what you have to do. Its fine to be fully focused on whatever the hell it is that you want to, but that doesn't mean you have to ignore _everything_ else along the way." From this, the boy continued to cloud watch for a few minutes. After a few minutes of silence, he looked down to see three pairs of widened eyes.

"Did I say something?" Naruto thought.

" **They're just surprised that you have a thought process** ," Kyuubi responded.

"Oh fuck off," Naruto responded to that.

Sasuke was the first to respond, his anger easily overwhelming his shock. His glare intensified on the boy before him, before closing and turning back forward, facing the Jonin.

"Whatever. I don't expect you to understand me."

Naruto chuckled, causing the Uchiha to turn back to him. "I understand you better than anyone else in the world, bastard. You may not think so now; you may not want to admit it, but you know that you and I share a certain kind of pain. You know we share loneliness. You want to bottle it all up, and take responsibility for all of the bad things that resonate within you. I don't know, maybe you think it's because its some sort of 'right' thing to do. But its not. You don't _have_ to do _any_ of this alone. I don't know what made you think that, but you don't. Just think about it a bit. Why would the answer to the pain and loneliness you feel be isolating yourself?"

And it was the end of this mini speech that the rooftop was left once again in silence. Naruto didn't notice. He had gone back to cloud watching.

"I can see why Shikamaru does this so often," Naruto commented, more to himself than anyone else. Kyuubi wasn't on board with the subject change.

" **Brat, did you just use the Talk no Jutsu**?" Kyuubi asked. His voice was slightly quivered. The use of that technique was fearful to experience, even if you weren't its intended target.

Just being witness to it bore effects.

Naruto shook his head. "No. That was about the power of a quarter of its ability. I wouldn't use it just for our meeting. I just needed to get those words out to Sasuke before it was too late. I hadn't perfected Talk until after Sasuke had already run off to Orochimaru, so I couldn't convince him to stay when it really mattered. Now that I _have_ perfected it, I wanted to test it real quick. See if it could change anything. What do you think?" Naruto asked while turning his head to look at Sasuke so Kurama could get a look.

The boy was shellshocked. His face was white and devoid of emotion. Regardless, one could see the internal struggle as new thoughts and emotions cycled through his mind.

" **I think there's a reason Tsunade banned that jutsu**."

"Oh its not that bad."

* * *

 _Meanwhile, elsewhere_

"This is really, really bad," Hagoromo stated from his viewing spot in the timeless zone. Rinnegan activated, the Sage could see the higher deities using the fullest extent of their powers to alter the path of the first meeting of Team 7 back to what it was before. Despite their best efforts however, the region around their residence just would not revert. It was somehow resisting the influence of the very beings that created it, and that was a worrying revelation.

"There is no way that this boy has created a technique that powerful," the Sage stated, his voice shaking. "This Talk no Jutsu… maybe Neji was right. Maybe this technique really is powerful enough to alter the world better than even the gods.

* * *

 _Back there_

After recovering from their second shock of the day (with Sasuke still deep in thought) the crew on the roof came to the last member of their team. After surviving the first two students however, Kakashi was unsure whether or not he was emotionally prepared to face this boy.

"And… you… Orange kid?" Kakashi asked, trepidation now apparent in his voice.

Naruto, his smile amplitude now cranked up past a million, cleared his throat and sat up. Looking from Sakura; who was slightly shivering, to Sasuke; who flinched a bit despite still being in his daze; to finally Kakashi who was utterly mortified, Naruto somehow flared his smile to dangerous levels before starting his introduction.

"My name is N-"

* * *

 _An hour later_

" **And now you're not allowed to introduce yourself anymore** ," the Kyuubi barked out between fits of laughter. He didn't need to breathe, yet somehow found himself struggling to find some air. Naruto could only scowl as he looked down at the pack of cards in his hand.

"I don't think they needed to make me ninja introduction cards though. This is just excessively extra," he turned the card over, "I didn't even think the concept of "ninja introduction cards" existed."

Kyuubi, who was now rolling on the floor of Naruto's gut, stopped his laughing just long enough to answer. " **They didn't! They were made specifically for you!** " This revelation only seemed to worsen Naruto's mood.

"Wait, so you're saying that the words on these cards weren't stock phrases?"

" **Nope. Made custom for you. I don't think these words could fit to anyone else.** "

"That's stupid!"

" **Shh, human. Don't give away everything on the card**."


	4. Chapter 4: Oh God What's Happening

_**Okay, so. Not nearly as much laughs here as before, but things have to get serious SOMETIME and well shit happens. Next chapter will come out sooner. Maybe later this week?**_

 _ **I don't have to write disclaimers right? We all know that I don't own anything on a site titled "fanfiction"**_

* * *

Naruto stood in the middle of a grassy field. The wind blew softly, carrying on it the sweet smell of spring grass and various other forms of nature in bloom. Turning to his left, Naruto saw his pink haired teammate, Sakura Haruno. Her hair was still long at this point in time, signifying that she was still not serious about being a ninja yet. Her fists were clenched, and her stare was set directly ahead. She had blinked very little since Kakashi had revealed to them what their test was, and if he looked close enough, he would see that she was shaking slightly. This test was probably incredibly nerve wracking to her, and he could see why.

" **Well.** **T** **his is totally different from the last time you** **fought** **your teacher with her** ," the Kyuubi growled from his place in the surrounding forest. He was hidden, using his chakra that was as natural as the trees around him to blend in. Kakashi wouldn't be noticing him unless he revealed his Sharingan. Knowing Naruto, he would probably be forced to.

Naruto had to agree with Kurama on this point. "Definitely. Last time we did this, Sakura punched a hole in the ground. The _ground_ Kyuubi. She was definitely something to be reckoned with. Now however," he started, looking to Sakura. She had swallowed hard, and it was obvious that she did it with some difficulty. She was close to the point of breaking.

" **It's hard to believe such a powerful human was once this**."

"Not really. Everyone started somewhere," Naruto rebutted. "Despite her weakness now, in her is the resolve to push herself to amazing lengths."

" **I** **was born** **being able to cause tsunamis with a single roar**."

"And look where you are now," Naruto continued, "you're able to be a pain in my ass in a single sentence."

At this, Kyuubi answered with an indignant snort. Naruto continued.

"Besides, Sakura became an amazing kunoichi, second only to Sasuke and myself. She did it all on her own, Kurama. Sasuke had the Sharingan and I had _you_. What did she have? Talent and hard work. Its something to respect."

Kurama mulled it over, before shrugging. He dismissed the point with a huff. " **Either way. Right now she's little more than useless to you. I'd suggest letting her clear out before letting loose**."

Naruto shook his head. "That wasn't the point of this test. Its to show teamwork. Beating Kakashi is nice and all, but even if I showed I had the brute strength there's no guarantee I'd pass."

" **Then you're just not showing enough brute strength.** " Kyuubi responded.

"Maybe."

Naruto then turned to see his other teammate. He wasn't… nearly as well. In fact one might say the opposite.

Sasuke stood to his other side in a daze. Blank eyes stared forward, not really taking in much around him. He had shuffled in the training area not far ahead of Kakashi, and kind of just collapsed where he and Sakura were relaxing. Since then his responses were little more than meaningless, hollow gestures and the limpest of movements in response to certain actions being taken.

Naruto started throwing pine cones at him.

It did not provoke a response.

Since _then_ Sasuke had walked to the starting point when Kakashi had gestured him to, and had not said nor did anything when told about the test. A blink every now and then was all Naruto had to know that the boy was still alive.

"I don't think he'll be much help," Naruto said, mostly to himself. He got a mental nod from Kyuubi and another, more reluctant one from Sakura.

"He's been like this all day yesterday. Especially after introductions," the pink haired ninja responded. To this effect she, albeit hesitantly, threw a pine cone at the Uchiha as well. It bounced off his head with a _dud_ and landed near the genius' feet. The boy blinked.

A thought occurred to Naruto. "How would you know what he was like _all day_ yesterday?" Sakura stared at him.

"Is that a question you really want an answer to?"

"It is not," Naruto responded, remembering slightly his own wife's stalking habits. Old stalking habits.

Dear God he hoped it was her old stalking habits.

Kakashi had by this point decided that they had enough time to prepare. Taking out a small blue book – one that Naruto had noted was not of the smut variety – the Jonin proceeded to read as he placed a small clock on a nearby stump and set it to an hour.

"I'm sure you already have the gist of it," the scarecrow said, his one eye entirely focused on the book before him, "but I'll reiterate it just in case you don't. You have an hour. Just _one_ hour to get one of these bells from my side. Those of you who get a bell will pass, while the one who doesn't will get sent back to the academy." Kakashi then paused for effect. He was disappointed when he only got one reaction out of the three kids before him. Sakura had gaped, fear drawn on her face at the idea of being sent back to the academy; Naruto had simply looked at him with a big, determined grin on his face. Sasuke hadn't changed since he entered. Kakashi was starting to get concerned.

" **W** **hen** **exactly did you come up with the Talk no Jutsu, brat?** " Kyuubi asked, concerned as well.

Naruto's face scrunched up in confusion, "why? What does it matter?"

" **No reason**."

Before Naruto could press however, Kakashi pressed a finger to the timer, starting the countdown. In a flash of speed, the man was back in the center of the clearing, his eye having never left the book.

"You may begin," he drawled, and two of the Genin were off in a burst of speed.

Sasuke stood in the middle of the grounds. He gaped wordlessly at something Kakashi could only imagine.

* * *

 _In the brush_

Sakura did some breathing exercises as she tried to calm her nerves. Things were definitely not normal around here anymore.

First off, things were weird with Sasuke. No, she never presumed to have maintained anything of a _normal_ relationship with the boy, but she at least hoped that being placed on the same team as him would improve things even a _little_. That was not the case however, for as soon as they were officially together, Naruto had to go off and tell that little speech that all but put her future husband in a coma!

Though to be honest, it had some effect on her as well. Who knew Naruto was a natural born speaker?

And going back to that, Naruto had changed as well. Where before he was an annoying, orange wearing loser who hung off of her at every chance he got, now he was more aloof and confident. He carried himself with a poise and grace that all but exuded some kind of regal aura. He still slouched and joked around when he was sure someone was looking— but in off times, when he was most relaxed, Sakura could feel it. Naruto held a sense of authority about him. One that wasn't there before.

Things weren't normal. Sakura wasn't sure what to make of that.

"I would be confused too," a voice said to her right. She nodded, glad there was someone to share her nerves.

It was then she realized she was hiding under a bush and there should really be no one there with her.

With a jump and a clumsy attempt to pull out a kunai, Sakura turned on the newcomer next to her. Her knife had barely made it a few inches before her wrist was grabbed and held by an iron grip.

Naruto laughed, "if that's always going to be your reaction to me, we're going to have a terrible time on this team."

Sakura blanched, somewhat ashamed at her knee jerk reaction. Settling the kunai down slightly at her side, but not putting it away, the girl turned to see if her actions had alerted the Jonin in the center of the field. The scarecrow had taken to walking around the boy in the center, who was doing a far better rendition of a scarecrow than he. With a slightly relieved sigh, the girl turned back to her other teammate.

" _What exactly_ do you think you're doing?" Sakura asked in a hushed whisper. Her tone conveyed very little amusement. Whether Naruto noticed or not mattered little, as the boy just smiled back at her. Sakura had the urge to shield her eyes from how bright it was.

"I just wanted to see if you wanted to help me take down our sensei," he responded. Absently he fiddled with Iruka's headband. This was before he had to switch the cloth because it was damaged from Jiraiya's training. Something about the original material felt so much more comfortable.

Sakura scowled. She kept half an eye on the proceedings outside their conversation. Kakashi had started to poke Sasuke with a stick. The Uchiha flinched when he was poked in sensitive areas, but otherwise made no effort to either move or stop the man.

She looked back to Naruto. "Help you?" she asked, "how exactly do you intend to do to take him down?" In response Naruto smiled. It was a wicked smile. A smile not fit on the faces of mortal men. Sakura found herself shivering.

"Sakura. I have a plan," the orange Genin replied. Sakura didn't know, but it was on this day that she had felt true fear for the first time in her life. It was soul crushing and empty, leaving her in a void of insurmountable hopelessness.

And the worst part? It was for someone other than her.

* * *

Kakashi, now tired of poking the first of his Genin with a stick, decided now was as good a time as any to go find the other two.

To poke, of course.

With a quick one-two jab, the Uchiha was handily laid out on his back. The boy just flopped to the floor, not bothering to brace himself or react in any way to his new predicament.

Kakashi shrugged, before turning around to look for his other two cute students. The man had to admit; out of all of the kids to stand and "fight" in the middle of the field, he half expected the blonde to be the one to do it. Confident, cocky and looking to prove something was practically the kid's entire MO. His sudden change was… unexpected… to say the very least.

Kakashi glanced over to where he had seen Sakura, the pink haired student, dash to. She did well to hide her presence and deflect her exit path from where it was expected, but her movements were all academic in execution. As in woefully standard. Kakashi could tell the textbook feints and intentional noise distractions because he had studied them when he was in the Academy not too long ago. He followed her, and her pink hair, for every movement she made until she finally settled under the brush and kept an eye on her the entire time, up until he started to mess with her crush. He was sure the pinkette would be too nervous to move from that spot as she had not moved the entire ten minutes he was waiting, but apparently she was more cunning than he had anticipated. Sometime while he was poking at the boy, she had disappeared.

Oh well, just means he would have to find her. With this thought in mind, the Jonin disappeared in a shunshin.

They couldn't get far from a tracker ninja. Not when he himself was their target.

* * *

Sakura tried her best to keep her attention away from Naruto as both him and his tangible clones dumped parcel after parcel into a huge pile in a small outcropping in the middle of the forest. They were near a river, and what started as a small bundle slowly became a rising mountain of things that Naruto was collecting. When asked what, the boy had just responded with a smile and a wave, telling her that there was nothing to worry about.

For in truth, there was absolutely nothing for _her_ to worry about. Nothing in this ever growing pile of parcels and paper had any real significance to his Genin teammate in any way. Years would pass before Sakura had any sort of revelation to even consider any of the things he was gathering of any importance. Said things were not true for his Jonin sensei, however. Their teacher landed in their clearing shortly after Naruto had grown the pile to a size for his liking, and even then the boy had clones bring in more parcels.

Naruto turned from his work with a very visible smile on his face. Kakashi couldn't place the feeling exactly, but for some reason he had the slightest inkling that he was experiencing a precursor to fear.

"Welcome Kakashi-sensei," Naruto greeted. He had his hands on his hips and stood with a pose facing his teacher. Behind him and to his right, Kakashi could see Sakura standing with a kunai at the ready. Their countenance were entirely opposite, so Kakashi decided to focus first on the more relaxed of the two.

"That's a mighty impressive pile you have there," Kakashi drawled while taking notice of the stack behind the boy. Even as he talked the pile grew ever bigger, the clones piling on more from elsewhere. From where, Kakashi couldn't fathom, but they were certainly working like a bat out of hell. When the boy – who Kakashi assumed was the original – just looked behind him at the pile before looking back at him and shrugging, Kakashi continued. "I hope you don't think a pile of junk would be enough to beat me." To this statement Naruto smiled even harder, and Kakashi could feel the sense of dread return twofold.

Despite the dread, or perhaps because of it, that Naruto could feel on his teacher's face, the boy decided that now was the best time to start his plan. With a grand sweep of his arm, the paper on every parcel dropped in the pile disappeared, revealing an assortment of vividly colored books. Each one had a different picture of a girl and a heart and the title "Icha Icha" could be seen plastered on the front.

Kakashi was understandably surprised. Not that anyone would notice beyond the widening of his eye.

Awestruck, the Jonin's body went stiff. His hand twitched, no doubt wanting to do nothing more than reach forward and delve through the utopia before him. After half a minute, the Jonin finally recomposed himself enough to speak.

"Naruto. What… what is this? How did you-"

"This is our key to victory, sensei", Naruto interrupted. Using his outstretched arm, Naruto snapped his fingers, and off in the distance a resounding _boom_ echoed throughout the forest. It sounded somewhat like a cannon.

"What was that?" Kakashi asked, looking around. Nothing seemed to be coming at him or hurtling through the trees.

"I think you should focus more on what's in front of you," Naruto responded, and with a burst of speed, the orange Genin-turned-Hokage and back to Genin disappeared from sight. Kakashi went immediately on guard, knowing now that the boy was full of surprises. Before most could perceive, the book in his hand was replaced by a kunai and his stance changed to a low, almost crouching frame. Eye darting left and right, Kakashi employed his sight, scent, and hearing to the cause of tracking his orange student.

The Jonin was of course alert. He was the most alert he could possibly be. Without a doubt however, the boy had all but disappeared from his senses. Every single one of them. After three minutes of no response, Kakashi turned his eye to Sakura. When she flinched under his intense, analytical gaze (which was meant for Naruto), he attempted to soften his stare. He hadn't succeeded, but it was apparent the girl appreciated the gesture when she calmed slightly.

I mean, the knife was still in her hand and pointed at him, but it was more of a courtesy than an actual threat. What ninja _didn't_ point a knife at their closest friends at some point in their lives?

"So what's your thing?" Kakashi asked conversationally, eye still scanning the forest for Naruto. As soon as the boy moved, he had vanished from Kakashi's radar in every aspect. That did not sit well with him.

Sakura, who was now just standing in no kind of stance, just tilted her head. "What do you mean, sensei?"

"I mean, what's your thing? Your schtick?" Kakashi answered while turning in place. Up, left and right, forward, and behind. Taking a cursory glance downward, even though he doubted Naruto knew the jutsu, Kakashi checked underneath him as well. Nothing there. "Your teammates all have _things_. What's yours?"

Sakura looked slightly appalled. "They don't _all_ have things."

"They do," Kakashi responded. Looking in the air, he could see the sun. He placed it relative to where it was when the test started and assumed his students had about fifteen minutes left. Naruto didn't seem to be showing up, so the Jonin reluctantly relaxed from his stance. Taking one last look around, Kakashi turned back to Sakura. She had put the knife away and folded her arms.

"Like what?" the girl asked in a huff. Kakashi stared at her with a single, lazy eye. He somehow conveyed the look that one gives a mentally challenged puppy. He indulged her anyway.

"Let's start with your little boyfriend," Kakashi started, to the pink haired girls both horror and glee. "He's basically a vegetable."

"Vegetables are good for you!" Sakura yelled back. She inched slightly away from the stack of books behind her, reminding Kakashi of their existence. The Jonin's hand flinched again, temptation barely being reigned in. Kakashi squashed the feeling immediately. He wasn't sure of what trap lay hidden yet. His eye wandered back to his pink haired student, and if the indignant stare she was sending his way was any indication, she was not pleased with being ignored for smut.

"He's not a good vegetable," Kakashi retorted. His hand twitched again, almost moving forward again. He clenched that hand into a fist as tight as he could. Maybe withdrawing from the stuff wasn't his best idea. The temptation was starting to get unbearable.

Sakura wasn't having any of Kakashi's words. "Name a single vegetable that isn't good for you."

"Celery," Kakashi replied without hesitating, "you burn more calories eating it than you actually gain from the act."

"That's great for diets!" Sakura spat back, her arms now crossed.

"And diets aren't exactly something someone in our line of work should be indulging in. We spend enough energy in a day to warrant a week's worth of food for a normal person. Empty calories aren't something we particularly need."

"So, what? Are you saying we don't need Sasuke?" Sakura retorted in a huff. When Kakashi just looked at her, Sakura blanched, "we _do_ need Sasuke!"

Kakashi just sighed. Taking one more glance around, he finally stood upright before walking slowly over to the Genin.

"Wh-what are you doing?" Sakura asked, her face slightly paling upon seeing her teacher move towards her. The Jonin, completely disregarding her, continued moving as if she hadn't existed.

"Well, your teammate obviously isn't showing himself."

Sakura bristled. "So?"

"Well, then obviously he doesn't seem to care. None of you managed to get any of these bells away from me and your time is almost up. You've failed," the Jonin replied. With a narrowing of his eye, he glared at the pink haired student before him. "Unless you mean to say that _you_ want to get them from me?"

The slight step back she took was all the answer he needed.

"Then I will proceed to do as I please. You have all failed and I have held myself back long enough." At some point while he was explaining himself he had stopped, and now done, the scarecrow continued his stride toward Sakura. It wasn't a fast gait, but it was strong and full of purpose. Sakura flinched, but pulled out a second kunai regardless. Bracing herself, the girl saw that her actions had temporarily surprised the man in front of her. Stopping in shock, the man considered the girl in front of him before continuing his stroll, with no change in demeanor save for a slightly more bemused expression.

"Oh? So are you going to stop me after all?" Kakashi asked, a tone of mirth in his voice. Sakura ground her teeth slightly to calm her nerves before answering.

"Aren't you going to tell me about Naruto's quirk?" she asked, trying to deflect the situation. Kakashi wasn't amused. Disregarding her question, the silver haired Jonin reached forward. Sakura could feel her nerves strain to their most and, closing her eyes, the poor girl turned her head and closed her eyes as to try to ward off the inevitable.

So her surprise when she felt her sensei reach past her completely was perfectly understandable.

Opening her eyes, Sakura traced Kakashi's arm to his hand, seeing that she was in fact not his goal at all. Gingerly the man picked up a copy of Icha Icha Night, a copy he had not owned yet, and set to reading it. His kunai holstered, the man dedicated his focus to the book in front of him. After a moment of silence, the man looked up from his book once more to see Sakura staring agape. Kakashi stared back at her, a single lazy eye slightly tinged with curiosity. Surely his actions weren't _too_ far out of the ordinary?

"Is there something wrong?" Kakashi asked, his eyes darting between his student and the words on the page, not really paying attention to either.

Sakura, after a moment deliberation to get herself together, managed an answer. "N-nothing Sensei. I'm just… surprised."

"Surprised?" Kakashi asked, an eyebrow quirking. "I do thigns like this all the time. Surely you've heard of my reputation?" She had to have. At this point, the ex-ANBU member was almost certain that he was more known for his habitual porn reading than his Sharingan. This was a fact he was quickly coming to terms with. Sakura had simply shook her head at his question.

"No, its not that," Sakura answered, before lowering her head so that her hair slightly covered it. A few quiet seconds passed, before Kakashi could hear a slight giggling. High pitched and melodious, the girl managed to keep her mirth under wraps a few seconds longer before her giggles evolved into chuckles, and then full blown laughter. Unable to contain herself any longer, the girl had all but fallen to the floor in pure amusement. Kakashi however, was only confused.

"What's so funny?" he asked. This wasn't the appropriate reaction of a Genin five minutes away from failure. Sakura, who was now just barely holding herself up on one of her hands and her knees, could only choke as she tried to answer through her gasps for air. A few more seconds passed, and she managed to get herself mostly under control.

"I'm… I'm surprised that you _actually_ fell for it! Every single little bit of his plan!" Sakura managed to gasp out, and it was at this moment that Kakashi realized his mistake. Whirling on his heel, the Jonin had just enough time to bring up his arms in a cross to block the heavy haymaker from the speeding bullet of orange. Kakashi's knees buckled under the weight of the attack, and suddenly Naruto's _thing_ re-asserted itself in the one eyed man's mind.

The boy was far, _far_ more powerful than he let on.

"Lesson One," the boy announced, the shockwave from the boy's launch finally catching up and launching the Jonin back and over the pile of porn. Dragging along the ground, the Jonin created a ditch in the dirt, before recollecting himself and looking back at his student.

"Taijutsu."


	5. Chapter 5: We Found the Mcguffin

Naruto Crack Fic 5 

**_I wonder if I'll ever get fanart. I'll look forward to the day someone decides to draw the bullshit scenarios I think of._**

 ** _Also, here's the new chapter and all that. The next chapter will actually include things I actually look forward to writing. It'll be fun, so I'll probably even update faster. Enjoy, please. I'd really like it if you enjoyed._**

* * *

Naruto landed from his launch in a crouch, his body parallel to the ground as he touched down. Taking a deep breath, the ex-Hokage prepared himself for the kind of high speed battle associated with elite level ninja.

" **You sure you don't need me for this, brat? Your fighting prowess is a bit on the… short side.** " Kyuubi commented from his place in the woods. He had been watching from beginning to end, and he was a little less than enthusiastic about the odds of them winning.

"Nah, I'm fine. Kakashi isn't as strong as he was in the future. We're both handicapped here." Naruto responded. Slowly, he rose from his position, staring down his old sensei as the man did the same. Kakashi didn't seem too pleased with his reintroduction.

"Just stick to the plan," Naruto finished, before immediately whirling on the spot. Crossing his arms over his chest, the orange boy was subjected to a right hook by the 'older' man which sent him sprawling back. Digging in his heels, the boy managed to anchor himself in the dirt after sliding for a few moments. When he finally stopped, he managed a smirk while fighting off the urge to rub his arm from the place of impact. The man hit harder than he remembered.

"Was that revenge, sensei?" Naruto asked. Kakashi, whose fist was still outstretched from his punch, had simply shook his gloved fist. Apparently Naruto wasn't the only one to get hurt from the exchange.

"No," the Jonin answered after a moment, "that was an introduction. _This_ is my revenge."

Suddenly a copy of the Jonin burst from the ground behind Naruto. His hands interlocking fingers with the index pointing out, the ex-ANBU thrust it forward faster than the Naruto could react, and the boy was subjected to a devastatingly powerful poke in a place he would rather it not be. The boy flinched, pain becoming apparent on his features, before smiling a wicked grin. Weaving through signs, Naruto initiated his technique.

"Exploding Clone Jutsu!"

XxX

Kyuubi flinched as the memories of the shadow clone rushed to both him and his container.

" **I will never understand your fascination with using that technique to counter that abominable prank.** " Kyuubi growled. He had taken to jumping through the forest to follow through on Naruto's plan. Little did Kakashi know that he had four people to work against. Naruto, who was nowhere near the fox, shrugged his shoulders. Through what could only be assumed as chakra magic did the fox manage to know of this.

"The Exploding Clone Jutsu is a wonderful technique. Just what you need to cause widespread damage and let everyone know it was you."

" **You know, if I didn't know any better, I'd liken you to Deidara**." Naruto scrunched his face.

"Who are you talking about now?" the boy asked.

" **Deidara? The mad bomber who was a part of Akatsuki? You fought him before**."

"Did I?" Naruto asked. He had landed in a different part of the forest from where he was fighting his sensei. After looking around a bit, he found what he was searching for and rapidly made his way over to it. "Tell me what he was like."

Kyuubi deadpanned, " **He was the** _ **Mad Bomber**_ **. Do I really need to explain to you what he was like?** "

Naruto didn't respond. That in itself was Kyuubi's answer.

" **He was the blonde guy with the hand mouths** ," Kyuubi answered with a sigh. Inwardly he cursed the blonde boy's terrible memory. Seeing as they shared a mind space and thus internal thoughts, this wasn't an "inward" occurrence at all.

"I heard that," Naruto replied indignantly.

" **I know**." Kyuubi replied immediately.

"Anyway," Naruto continued as he threw his finding over his shoulder, "I think I remember that guy. Didn't we tear his arms off?"

Kyuubi nodded.

"Sweet. I just noticed, but Konoha ninja had a history of tearing people's arms off."At this, Kyuubi raised an eyebrow.

" **Is that so?** " the fox asked. " **Prove it**."

"I tore off Deidara's arms."

" **Okay, that's one** ," Kyuubi remarked as he started to move through the trees again. Seeing nothing to note these tallies on, he lit a tree on fire.

"Old Man Hokage tore off Orochimaru's arms," Naruto stated. He had also started running through the trees at this point, and had noticed smoke coming up from afar. "Was that you?"

" **Yes** ," Kyuubi answered. " **So is this**." And at that, another tree went up in flames. " **Also, I don't think that counts. He still had his arms. The Hokage just sealed his soul arms**."

Naruto scowled, "He did that by tearing off his soul arms. It counts."

" **Fair enough** ," the fox responded. He lit another tree.

"Dude! You already counted that one!"

Kyuubi shrugged. Naruto groaned at his nonchalance. Then again, he himself had taken to randomly killing people. With his genocidal tendencies in mind, a thought occurred to him.

"Hey, Kyuubi?"

" **Yes meatbag?** " Kyuubi answered.

"Does deity induced damage control extend beyond just revival of people?"

Kyuubi pondered the idea. " **I dunno? Maybe. Why do you ask?** "

Naruto looked off into the distance to where the smoke should no doubt be increasing as the fire spread. Instead of doing that, the smoke was slowly regressing, until finally disappearing altogether. Knowing the Kyuubi's pyromania, Naruto decided this was probably for the best. Naruto was tempted to change the subject, but unfortunately their mind link worked both ways.

Kyuubi turned from where he was running in outrage. His most recent tree had already started to be put out.

" **Oh**."

"Kyuubi wait no calm down," Naruto stammered out.

" **Hell** "

"Kyuubi no we can talk about this."

" **To the FUCKING no!** " Kyuubi roared, and Naruto could feel the fox's ire as he raced back to the trees that were now perfectly fine. Inhaling deeply, the fox simply exhaled fire without the need for ninjutsu or hand seals. The fire engulfed the tree he was facing, and Naruto could feel the content wash over both him and Kyuubi. This content was quickly replaced by annoyance as the tree was immediately put out. A still silence permeated their link.

"Kurama? Are you-" Naruto started to ask after a minute. He was interrupted by his tenant.

" **Naruto. This means war.** "

Naruto sighed again.

"Of course it does."

XxX

Sakura watched as her teammate pretty much _exploded_ and her sensei's clone disappear as the real Kakashi was once again torpedoed across the clearing. He went 'thump' against a tree, before slowly falling down it and landing in a heap at its base. After a while of not moving, Sakura was pretty sure the man was out cold. Seeing the opportunity for what it was, she made her way over to him. Stopping only when she was within a few meters, the Genin inhaled deeply before inching over to him. Slowly, as if not to disturb the man's rest, Sakura gently leaned over to grab the two bells and be rid of this for all. She wasn't entirely too sure who she was going to give the other bell to, as Naruto was the entire cause this was happening in the first place, but having them and not knowing was a much better situation to be in than not.

Now, Sakura couldn't tell you what it was that told her to stop. Intuition? Ninja instinct finally kicking in after all these years? Either one or both could be accredited, for as her fingers were mere inches from the bells a feeling in her told her to _move_. Knowing that doubt on the battlefield could lead to death, Sakura immediately complied, throwing herself to the side as something small cut through the air where she previously was. Rolling out of her dodge into a crouch, Sakura saw the image of her sensei shimmer before phasing out of existence. In its place was a single kunai embedded in the tree.

" _Genjutsu_ ," Sakura thought. With a scowl, the pink Genin glared behind her to where Kakashi stood nonchalant. A second kunai twirled on his finger as he looked down on her, both figuratively and literally. Sakura stood up slowly. She retrieved a knife of her own as she did so.

"I have to admit," Kakashi droned as he watched her arm herself, "I didn't think you'd be able to dodge that. It appears not all of you are useless." Sakura replied to him with a molten glare.

"You almost killed me," the girl spat out. Had she not been so incensed she would be surprised at the hostility in her own voice. Whether Kakashi himself was surprised, or even affected in any way at all by her tone was a mystery, as the man continued on without a care.

"I told you before, Pinkie. The world you're trying to get into is not fun and games. The world you're trying to enter _will_ attempt to kill you every chance it gets. The world you're trying to be a part of wants _absolutely nothing_ more than to tear you limb to limb. The world you want to join so desperately is one filled with _death, despair,_ and _a lack of any sort of morals._ And honey?" Kakashi asked, leaning forward with a glint in his eyes. Sakura moved to answer, but she found it hard to with a blade against her throat. Blinking, Sakura could feel her sensei behind her – the clearing in front of her now empty.

" _When had he moved?_ "

"Honey, the world we're a part of gives no second chances, and you've just lost your only one." These were the last words Sakura heard before the knife slit her throat.

"This is the world of ninja Pinky, and unfortunately for you, I was your Gatekeeper."

XxX

Naruto landed back in the clearing and, with lots of flair, dumped his burden on the ground. He had spent the last few minutes falling from tree after tree in a fruitless attempt to calm the Kyuubi down. He hadn't succeeded in his attempt, but at the very least Kyuubi was focusing on a single tree now.

" **I will win this, boy** ," the Kyuubi growled. Even now Naruto could hear explosions in the background. He winced at the wanton destruction being tossed around. Even though the Kyuubi was only targeting a single tree, the methods of his destruction was no doubt enveloping many.

"Fine fine. Roar into the wind all you want fuzzball. Just be ready to fulfill your part when the time comes."

Naruto heard the Kyuubi growl. It was deep and guttural, and reminded the Hokage of years long past when the being wanted nothing more than to eat him. Of course, Kurama still aimed to eat him even now, but it wasn't the deep seated **desire** it was before.

" **I care not for your petty little plans anymore, human. This is a matter between being** **s** _ **much**_ **more sophisticated than you. I do not intend to lose it**."

"I didn't know you cared, fox."

" **I don't** ," Kyuubi responded. His answer was short and full of irritation. " **But I'd be damned if I lose to anyone besides you**." Naruto, upon hearing the Kyuubi's response, made a small heart over his chest.

"Aww, you big sweetheart you. Are you acknowledging my power?"

Kyuubi chuckled. " **I admit you are strong, brat. But you are still just barely a blip on my almighty radar. What I'm acknowledging is your luck. In that aspect of yours, and that aspect alone, I fear the quantity you possess. There is no way that you should be able to spit in the face of such stronger beings so often and still walk among the living,** **a** **nd yet, here you are;** **you're s** **miling like an idiot – the** **likes of which** **you definitely are, by the way – and devising a plan against your old sensei. I definitely fear you Naruto, but only because I have no feasible idea where your luck,** **and your unpredictability,** **ends**."

Naruto, who had started to make googly eyes at nothing, but with intent at Kurama, stopped to contemplate what his tenant had said. In his older body it was a deep and nerve wracking experience, as even with his goofy nature Naruto was feared across the Shinobi nation. In just a wave of his synthetic hand Naruto possessed more power and skill than even most of his own Jonin. Now however, it looked little more than adorable on his fat cheeks and large eyes.

"That's the second time I've heard something like that."

" **What? That you're an idiot?** " Kurama asked innocently. Naruto imagined a hammer falling on Kurama's head. Sure enough afterwards he could feel the fox flinching. Satisfied, Naruto answered.

"No, though I've heard too many of that as well. I've heard people say before that I'm just far too lucky. First Grandpa Sage said it and now you. I don't really see the connection."

" **Are you serious? You're really serious right now?** "

Naruto glared out a space. There was nothing in his immediate line of sight but the trees, but somehow Kurama got the message. "What? Yes! My life was entirely too hard if you ask me. If I listed every thing that happened to me throughout me life you'd stagger and fall in its inglorious magnitude!"

Kurama huffed, " **I know everything that happened through your life, boy. I was there. But go ahead** **and** **humor me.** "

"Well for starters, not five minutes after I was born a madman extracted a giant demon fox from my mother, nearly killing her in the process. That giant demon fox then went on to kill both my parents right in front of me, leaving me an orphan." Kyuubi scoffed.

" **Oh boo hoo. The poor ninja boy got a secondary source of power.** "

"You've tried to kill me on multiple occasions," Naruto deadpanned.

" **Oh boo hoo. The poor ninja boy had people attempt to kill him. If anything, more people try to kill you** _ **now**_ **than they ever did then.** " Kyuubi responded. His anger temporarily abated by the conversation, he stopped trying to blow up the tree. The pockmarked devastation around where he sat cross legged was slowly returning to normal.

" **You want to try again, idiot?** "

Naruto frowned slightly at the nickname, but otherwise said nothing about it. "My parents are dead. I grew up an orphan my entire life."

" **So did like half the Shinobi forces. You're not special in that aspect. When a ninja mommy and a ninja daddy love each other very much, they leave an infant to fend for themselves. Continue**."

"I was different from other kids. I had a giant chakra monster sealed into my gut-"

" **A process that you survived, by the way**."

"-and it was for that reason that I was ostracized and left to do on my own for so long, Kyu. I was bullied my entire childhood."

" **Bullying isn't uncommon amongst your species.** "

"Didn't you bully Shukaku?"

" **I never said it was uncommon amongst** _ **mine**_ **.** "

"Because of circumstances outside of my control, I was being hunted by some of the strongest people to walk the Elemental Nations."

" **And because of those you were able to meet equally powerful allies, most of which became very powerful connections** ," Kyuubi responded. He yawned. " **By the way, you also** _ **survived**_ **all of those encounters, which should not have been so. They could have killed and kidnapped you a thousand times over, what with how you brazenly run into danger. They don't however, and it confuses me.** "

"Pein killed the entire village."

" **A fact you reversed mere minutes later. A feat you did by… what was it again? Oh yes.** **Y** **ou** _ **talked the man to submission**_ **. Now that I think about it, for most of your fights you talk to the finish. Come on kid. I know you enjoy falling back on one trick ponies, but to use it every single time?** "

Naruto scoffed. "It worked on you, didn't it?"

Kyuubi barked back. It was a somewhat mocking gesture.

" **I never said it wasn't a potent ability. Once I find out how you do it I will immediately bring the world to its knees. That you haven't done so yet, even only temporarily, surprises me**."

Naruto contemplated the Kyuubi's words, before shrugging them off. "It doesn't interest me, world domination. I'd rather just look over the people I love and be done with the rest of the world." Naruto then kicked his package: the comatose form of Uchiha Sasuke. The boy flinched at the slight pain but did nothing else.

"Besides, I wouldn't want everyone to end up like him."

" **Yeah, about that** ," Kyuubi responded. He stared forlornly at the tree which just refused to remain as ashes, " **why is he still like that? Shouldn't the gods have fixed him by now?** "

To this, Naruto stared back at the raven haired boy. He hadn't noticed before, but the Uchiha had yet to become a dick again. It was something to be concerned about. Naruto, however, wasn't.

"I'm sure he'll be okay," he said while shrugging. Kyuubi sighed.

" **Whatever you say, kid. What of the other brat?** "

"Sakura? One sec." Naruto stated while looking around the arena. He was sure that this was where he left the two other members of his team, but neither were in immediate sight.

"They're not here."

" **Oh, what an astute observation. Do you want one gold star, or two?** "

"Shut it, furball. They _should_ be here. The porn books are over there, after all, and Sakura isn't strong enough yet to carry this fight elsewhere. Where the hell is she?"

It was then Naruto heard rustling in the woods behind him. Out of the branches and bushes stumbled no other than his target: one Kakashi Hatake, and under his arm he carried a bloodied Sakura. With all the nonchalance of someone taking out trash Kakashi tossed her body, which flopped through the air as if it had no vigor in it at all, to the blonde boy's feet. Naruto looked at it, at first confused, before that confusion turned into anger.

Kakashi, seeing this, decided to speak. "You should have been here for her instead of running around wasting time. Now you have one minute left, and no teammates to help you." The man then got into a fighting stance. He kept his body low, and his center of gravity even. "I hope you're ready."

Naruto, meanwhile, was only barely controlling his rage.

"Furball!"

" **Dear gods what, child?** " Kyuubi responded.

"What the hell is this?" the blonde boy asked, pointing down at his feet. Kyuubi tapped into their mental link to see through the boy's eyes. The fox stared and stared, looking carefully around and taking in everything he could see before answering.

" **That would be your feet, C student**."

"Yeah," Naruto replied, "I know."

Kyuubi waited for a bit. He waited for a little more than a bit actually, in some vain attempt to understand what exactly was going on in his tenant's head. The fox quickly realized what a futile attempt this was.

" **I'm sorry. I don't see where you are going with this.** **Would you mind elaborat** -"

"I _mean_ ," Naruto dragged out mentally, "that there is _supposed_ to be something there. Kakashi just walked out of the forest all menacingly and made a big show of throwing something at my feet _and I have no idea what it is_. I think its supposed to be genjutsu, but if it is then we have no idea of knowing what he's trying to show us."

" **And what is the problem with that? You're immune to his tricks**."

Naruto stared at the fox through their link. In truth he was still staring at his feet, but again, Kyuubi somehow knew what he was intending to do.

"Kyu. If I don't know what he's trying to trick me with, then how, pray tell, am I supposed to fuck with him?" And here Kyuubi immediately realized his error.

" **Shit, you're right. Alright we can work this out. What did he say when he walked up to you?** " Naruto thought hard. He believed Kakashi said something about "wasting time", "protecting" and "no one to help."

" **I see** ," the fox mused, " **well, with the absence of your pink teammate and the coma of your other one, I think its safe to assume that he is trying to show you the body of your non-potato teammate in order to either discourage you or enrage you.** " Naruto played with the idea.

"Yeah, that's a good guess. I think I remember Sakura saying something along those lines happening to her during the first run through of _our_ Genin Exams."

" **Wait.** **Y** **ou remembered THAT innocuous little detail but you forget the abilities of one of the very few people to actually come close to killing you**?"

"Deidaisy was never that close to killing me."

" **Deidara**."

"Whatever," Naruto shrugged. He then took a deep breath, before looking at Kakashi with as much genuine anger as he could whip up at the moment. In truth, it wasn't a lot, but damn was he trying.

" **He took all your ramen and burned it in a fire**."

"YOU BASTARD YOU'LL PAY FOR THIS." Naruto roared as he blasted from his spot. Kakashi, for his part, only managed a slight moment of shock before responding in kind. Instantaneously a high speed dance of fists and kicks erupted between the two ninja, only liberated by a short reprieve when both had to take a breath.

Kakashi was the first to break off. His breathing was labored as he did not expect to have to engage in battle against one of his students for so long. That exchange was, for lack of better words, actually not too rudimentary. Naruto, while leaving quite a few openings, performed feints and executed moves in preparation for others about three moves ahead. He attempted (and failed) to corral Kakashi into making amateur mistakes, and even though his anger had made him reckless, he wasn't the only one disadvantaged.

The Jonin had hid it well, but the effect of Naruto's opening attack from when he literally rocketed out of the trees and struck him had damaged him greatly. The scarecrow had managed to block, just barely, but it was like taking a sledgehammer to his arms. His bones creaked and ached, and it hurt to move them too much. He found himself unable to block some of his student's moves, and as such took damage in places he otherwise would have been fine.

Meanwhile Naruto wasn't doing too hot either. "We have forty five seconds Kyuubi. Get your ass over here." In response, the fox boy yawned.

" **I'll get there when I get there.** "

Unfortunately Kakashi was already there and making every use of this ability. Shortly after Naruto finished his mental conversation Kakashi had reengaged, and Naruto found himself in a flurry of blows. The short blonde could see that Kakashi was favoring kicks over punches, but in the end that initial blow of his only managed to even the field. Kyuubi had been right: he was shorter, weaker, and just not used to his body anymore, which gave him handicaps that far outstripped his senior fighting wisdom. He overreached, under reached, and then plain just lost balance at times, which gave Kakashi more than enough time to beat him over the head because of it. It was frustrating to say the least. Naruto found himself put quickly on the defensive and, had he not known of his sensei's fighting style, he would have quickly succumbed to the man.

This took place in the span of ten seconds.

Naruto grunted and dug in his heels again. The last exchange with the currently older man had him reeling, and he had to stop himself from flying off. Lidded blue eyes locked onto Kakashi's singular black one. He looked just as tired as Naruto felt, but he had yet to reveal his Sharingan. That did not bode well.

"Kurama. I need you. _Now_."

" **Hold your horses. I'm almost there**."

"I will do whatever the hell I want to with my horses," Naruto responded. It was cheeky, but Naruto needed some form of nerve control. Kakashi was reaching for his headband.

Naruto wasn't entirely too sure he could take the man as he was now. Clumsy, injured, and barely holding on.

"You're more trouble than you seem, Uzumaki," Kakashi stated. His voice was low and menacing, and he stalked towards Naruto like a wolf ready to hunt. Naruto found himself repressing the need to shiver. How he wished he could still reach the top ramen now.

"I was always a prankster," Naruto responded. The boy had taken to backing up, one step away for every step Kakashi took towards him. Their sizes were much too different though, so Kakashi was slowly gaining.

"No," Kakashi muttered. He had an edge of steel to his voice. His hand had just gripped the bottom of his headband. "You're stronger than you should be too. Fun fact, Naruto. My Sharingan doesn't record things that I see in my dreams, and I definitely remember you knocking me out with that harem technique of yours. Ingenious, sure, but still treacherous. You could have killed me."

"But I didn't." Naruto added, hoping it would help his case. It didn't.

"Yes, that is true," Kakashi responded, "which is why I played along with you. At first you had done nothing to ring any alarms, but now it brings me to another problem." Here Kakashi finally lifted his headband. His other eye spun with a practiced and fully controlled swirl. Closing his other eye, Kakashi's legs tensed, and the man looked more ready than ever to pounce.

"You know too much for a kid your age. What exactly are you planning?"

"No-nothing sensei!" Naruto yelped. As fast as he could, the ex-Hokage brought up his hands to perform the Harem jutsu once again, only for his wrist to be grabbed on the second, and very last, seal.

"No, not again." Kakashi muttered, his voice low as a whisper. The man then yanked on Naruto's arm, slamming it into a nearby tree. Twenty seconds.

"Kurama, get your lazy ass _into GEAR NOW_."

" **Alright, meat sack I'm here**."

Kakashi, who had by now produced a kunai, had held it to Naruto's neck. He had begun to start interrogating the boy when he heard the rustling of paper behind him. Sparing a quick glance, Kakashi was surprised to find a clone of Naruto there, standing on the mountain of smut.

" **Hi there**." Kyuubi chirped. He wore a wide, toothy grin and placed a hand on his hips. He looked nonchalant and uncaring, but that made sense for who he is. In order to really hammer in the message though, the fox waved.

Kakashi was not impressed. Turning back to the original, Kakashi fixed him with a Sharingan enhanced glare. "Is this your last act? I expected better of you. A single clone won't be enough to stop me."

Naruto laughed. "Who said he was to stop you?"

Kakashi, who was now slightly confused by both Naruto's mirth, just turned back to the foxified boy behind him. Next to the boy now sat a barrel, the object quickly becoming a seat for the apparition.

" **Hey, sensei? Guess what's in here?** "

Kakashi didn't answer.

" **I'll give you a hint** ," the fox stated cheekily, " **I really, really love fire**."

And just like that, the fox boy jumped high into the air. Without nary a hand seal, the fox blew a small fireball down to the barrel, igniting it. Kakashi, slightly confused at what was going on initially, was in no position to stop what was happening. In an instant the barrel, as well as what gasoline had spilled all over the books, had caught flame, bathing the books in an all-consuming fire of indescribable heat. Naruto had to gasp for air as Kakashi lost feeling in his arms.

"No..." Kakashi gasped out. He was forced to watch the scene not only in real time with his normal eye, which had opened unconsciously through shock, but with his Sharingan eye as well. He had witnessed the sacrilege burning of what he amounted to an almost holy book with his own two eyes, and now he could never forget. His Sharingan had once again copied something he wish it hadn't, and now this scene was burned into his eyes forever. Rage now overcoming his shock, he turned on the just now recovering blonde with hatred leaking out of his every feature.

"You… you _monster_." Kakashi growled.

Naruto started chuckling.

"You don't even know the half of it."

Kakashi had started stalking towards Naruto once again. His hand flinched, now devoid of any smut and with the urge to start up a chidori."

"Give me one reason I shouldn't tear you apart."

"They were all in there."

Kakashi stopped.

"Excuse me?"

"All of them, Kakashi-sensei. Every single Icha Icha Paradise in existence in this village was in that bonfire. Congratulations."

Kakashi, whose hand was about to spark slightly, started to shake. "What do you mean? That can't be-"

"It is. All of them."

"Impossible!" Kakashi shrieked. "You couldn't have gotten..."

"Yes," Naruto interrupted, "even the ones you had stashed away in your secret underground bunker. As of today, right now, there are absolutely no more Icha Icha in the Village Hidden in the Leaves!"

And Kakashi, whose eye scanned every single book in the pile in horror, knew that this was true. He weeped. He weeped and weeped and collapsed, his body sagging as if he had no bones.

"I don't… I can't..."

"Its okay Kakashi-sensei," Naruto consoled the man as he walked over to him. Reaching down, the boy grabbed the bells from the man's waist. A second after he did so, the bell rang, ending the test. "You still have the Icha Icha Nights." At this, the man seemed to become reinvigorated. Bolting upright, Kakashi reached around himself frantically, before reaching into his pouch and pulling out the purple cover book. Kakashi opened its edges and peered through its contents, his eyes drinking in its words as fast as he could.

He then immediately collapsed, his eyes a dead, empty void.

Kyuubi appeared in the clearing. " **What did you do to him this time?** " Naruto started to chuckle.

"There is no copy of Icha Icha Nights, Kurama," Naruto responded. He had then started to roll on the ground, laughing his sides off. "In that book, I included a couple pages from other works I remembered, then filled the rest of the pages with " _There is no such thing as Icha Icha_." Naruto started to literally howl.

"He's going to be out forever, hahaahahahaha."

Naruto continued to roll on the floor for several more minutes, the bells rolling with him, creating a harmonious jingling sound with uproarious laughter. After a while he noticed the Kyuubi was not celebrating with him.

"Kyuubi?" Naruto asked, sitting up. "What's wrong? This was hilarious!"

Kyuubi didn't respond to Naruto. Not directly.

" **Uh, kid? Did you forget anything? Like, anything at all?** " the Kyuubi asked. Naruto stared at him, then tried to think hard about anything he might have missed. When he couldn't think of anything, he turned back to Kyuubi.

"Not that I know of, no." Naruto answered.

" **Ah, I see. Then this should be even funnier**."

"What are you talking about Kuram-" was all Naruto was able to get out before a palm enveloped in blue, chakra flames hit him in the nape of his neck. The boy was sent sprawling across the clearing, missing the foxy form of Kyuubi after he dodged, and slamming into a tree. The boy slumped to the ground unconscious. Kyuubi turned back to the boy who had knocked his companion clean out. He then started laughing.

" **HAHHAAHAHHAHAHAAAA** ," Kyuubi roared, " **That was golden.** "

Neji, whose palm was still outstretched from his strike, simply stared at the clone before him.

"I don't understand," Neji stated, his voice barely remaining stoic. "Aren't Naruto's clones supposed to explode when the original is knocked out?"

Kyuubi choked down a laugh. " **I'm not like the other** **clones**."

Neji tilted his head. "What do you mean, Naruto? And why is your voice so low?"

" **It's because I'm not Naruto. I'm the Kyuubi**."

"Ah."

" **Indeed.** "

The two beings older than the bodies they inhabited then stood among the full (unconscious) Team 7.


	6. Chapter 6: A Whole New World

_**Hey guys. Your wonderful author, Redyoshi14 here. We have reached that super wonderful point where I'm actually starting to take this story seriously. I have things I want to happen and scenes I want to make impossibly come true, which means faster updates and more reliable writing. Sounds great, right?**_

 _ **Wrong. You're wrong. You're so dead wrong it hurts.**_

 _ **Cause, you see, as soon as I start taking this seriously, things start getting less random. When I care about what happens I get self conscious about my writing. For all I know, you guys are only here for the random. Don't get me wrong, the places I want to take this story are all still pretty out there, but it'll be more in the way of "planned random" rather than "what happens next oh well we'll both see together".**_

 _ **What I'm basically asking is... what do you think?**_

 _ **But enough of that. I know what you're really here for. On with the story!**_

* * *

"So Sakura isn't really dead?" Neji asked Naruto as they walked through one of the main roads of town. It was a busy day, and townspeople and merchants alike were scrambling to and from the main gates of Konoha. Despite the busy traffic however, the civilians managed to give the two boys a wide berth. It didn't have anything to do with Kyuubi though, who was quite literally standing aside the two boys as they talked. No, civilians just knew not to interfere with a ninja in any of their goings-on. It was just bad survival instinct.

"No," Naruto answered in between licks of his ice cream pop. It was blue and the boy wasn't really too sure what the flavor was, but he remembered eating it a lot with Jiraiya. "That was just a genjutsu Kakashi cast on her with the Sharingan to make her _think_ she was dead. Commonplace stuff really. It knocked her out like a light and allowed him to make quick work of her." Naruto shrugged. "I guess he really wanted to get all three basic tenants of Shinobi out of the way."

Neji, who was also eating a blue ice cream pop, turned to his friend. "Three? There are like _eighteen_. What do you mean three basic?"

"I mean _taijutsu_ , _genjutsu_ , and _ninjutsu_."

Neji stared at the boy. "And then?"

Naruto stared back. "What do you mean, _and then_?"

"Well, if he's going to teach you those three, what about _kenjutsu_ , _shurikenjutsu_ and _bukijutsu_?" Naruto threw his hands in the air. The ice cream pop stayed in his hands somehow.

"No one ever even _does_ those. Everyone focuses on the main three!"

"Tenten would disagree."

"That's cause she's a _weapons_ specialist. Of course she would focus on those things. Literally no one else do-"

"And what about Lee? He can't even _use_ ninjutsu and genjutsu, so how are those even the main three for him? If anything, _his_ main three would be taijutsu, then kenjutsu and then bukijutsu. He uses all three to compliment his style."

"Well, again, that's a special case and-"

" **H** **e has a point there. I don't use any of those. If anything, I specialize in** _ **kinjutsu**_." Kyuubi replied. He was slightly more done with his ice cream pop than the other two. No one outside of the time travelers seemed to notice the foxy boy was there, and so every so often he tripped someone.

Naruto started to grind his teeth. "You're not even a ninja-"

"And what about Lady Tsunade? She doesn't even _use_ ninjutsu. Or genjutsu either really. Its all crude taijutsu and healing jutsu. She grew up to be _Hokage_."

"To be fair she was like a million years old and she _was_ trained by Grandpa Third and..."

" **And there's even you. You barely know either ninjutsu or genjutsu. You use clones and lots of taijutsu, so one could say that you're not even on that list of main three,** **what with how you bastardize two of those tenants and flat out ignore the third**."

At this point Naruto got fed up. Charging a Rasengan in his hand, then crushing it, Naruto used the latent kinetic energy to punch Kyuubi through a building. The establishment collapsed on him. Neji could barely contain his shock.

"Naruto!" the blank eyed boy screamed. He pointed to the destroyed building, his mouth agape.

"What?" the blonde asked.

"What the Sage was that?!"

"Oh, that?" Naruto asked. He started to scratch his head. "If I compress the Rasengan's energy in my hand, I can focus the power into a punch and..."

"What?" Neji sputtered. "No, I mean the destroying of the property! How many people could you have just killed?"

" **Yeah, and don't even worry about what happened to** _ **me**_." Kyuubi muttered, climbing out the rubble. " **And I was almost done with that popsicle too**."

Naruto shrugged, "I dunno. Probably a lot; it was a big building. Why?"

Neji looked like he was going to burst. "Since _when_ were we about killing innocent civilians? How much have you changed in the years, Naruto? What happened to the Naruto who was about protecting his loved ones and everyone in the village?"

Naruto stared.

"Well, I'm _still_ about that, I guess," the blond answered, "just back in our own village. Not this one."

"What's the difference?" Neji asked, his eyes ready to bulge out of his head. "These people could have grown up to be the merchants who protected you or something!" Neji by this point had started to pace back and forth. It was obvious he was trying to work out how to fix this. Noticing Neji's panic, Naruto realized something.

Neji didn't know about the rules of the time jump. Naruto walked up – or tried to walk up – to the boy, but he found the process rather hard as Neji was pacing quite fast.

"Wait, hold on Neji. There's an-"

"Okay Naruto, I have a plan. Keep in mind the only reason I'm going to help you is because you resurrected me. So here's what we do. I'm going to cause a distraction. With the city in chaos, you'll take Kurama and high tail it as fast as you can from the village..."

"Wait, Neji. I don't think you understa-"

"Not _now_ Naruto!" Neji snapped. "I'm trying to save your life!"

Naruto turned to Kurama. That was an interesting idea actually. "Can we die here?"

Kurama responded with a halfhearted shrug. His next action was to take Naruto's quarter done ice pop.

"I suppose it's going to be hard for you to evade hunter ninja for too long, but in our past life you _were_ a Hokage, so they shouldn't pose too much of a threat to you..."

"Neji wait a minute. There's something you need to-"

"Then I suppose that you can make a living in Suna. They're not _too_ friendly with Konoha right now, right? We can hide you off there." Then Neji got a really excited look on his face. "You can Talk no Jutsu the Kazekage!"

Kyuubi put his hand on Neji's shoulder. The boy looked at the fox boy in alarm.

" **I assumed you to be the responsible one. Don't go around suggesting such liberal use of dangerous** **techniques** **ever again**."

"Aren't you the creature that created an ability with the sole purpose of destroying large amounts of landscape?" Naruto asked.

" **And yet here I stand, almost wholeheartedly assuring you that it pales in comparison to what your technique could do**."

Around here Neji started to sober up. "Yes, you're right Mr. Kyuubi-"

" **Please, I prefer Lord**."

"… I was going on a bit of a wild spree there." Neji continued, completely ignoring the fox from that point on. "But the point still stands. We have to find some way to get you out of here. If the ANBU arrive and see what you've done, they'll surely – why is the house reformed?"

Sure enough the house had reformed.

"That's what I was trying to tell you, Neji," Naruto assured the Hyuuga. With a slightly reassuring look, Naruto attempted to say his next words carefully. "Nothing we actually do here has any consequence."

"Elaborate," Neji stated. He was staring at the house. Literally staring at it, Byakugan blazing, as the house reformed itself in front of his eyes. It would be captivating if it weren't so completely ridiculous.

"Well, to put it simply, the gods and powers-that-be find my life supremely hilarious. They want me to relive my life _exactly_ as the way it was before, and for that reason they will not let me do anything out of the ordinary. Anything that I do that goes against the grain, such as destroying houses or..." Naruto trailed off. He looked around a bit, before finding a suitable target. With the grace and ease of a man who had trained to become the strongest fighter in the shinobi world, Naruto threw his kunai and pierced the head of a man walking down a street almost three blocks down. Naruto had pat himself on the shoulder for firing the blade around the many civilians between them, but Neji could only look on in muted horror.

"Killing peop-"

"Killing people, yes." Neji finished. The boy appeared to be looking at the reforming wreckage of the house still, but since his Byakugan was active, Naruto knew he was also keeping an eye on the villager, who was now standing back up. Casually, the villager pulled the bloodied kunai out of his skull and dropped it to the ground, before continuing on through the village with a recovering hole in his face.

"So… nothing matters what we do?" Neji asked. By now the house had fully reformed, both inside and out, and the people inside had started to move about as if nothing had just happened.

"Nope," Naruto answered, "not so long as it doesn't somehow correspond with what was _actually_ supposed to happen around then."

"Well, I really wish you had told me that sooner."

"Hmm? Why?" Naruto asked. They had started walking down the street again.

"Because," Neji responded, "if you had, maybe I wouldn't have tried so hard to stick to the proverbial plan. I've been walking on eggshells trying to do _exactly_ the same things I had done all those years ago. Not easy when it happened almost four years ago for me."

"Try like thirty for me," Naruto responded.

" **Try never for me**." Kyuubi chimed in.

"Yeah, I've been meaning to ask about that," Neji asked, "Naruto?"

"Hm?"

Neji pointed to the Kyuubi.

"The fuck?"

"Oh, that." Naruto commented offhandedly. "Yeah, when we became partners I didn't really think it fair for us to be sitting on uneven terms, so he can leave pretty much whenever he wants. The only reason he ever stays inside me anymore is cause he's too lazy to find his own apartment."

" **I don't find the housing market too favorable right now.** " Kyuubi stated matter of factly. " **Plus, people don't usually have too much success selling to a gigantic, fire breathing fox with extremely malevolent intentions**."

Neji stared.

"He doesn't fit in well with the neighborhood watch," Naruto clarified.

"I have a feeling he's what the neighborhood is watching for."

"Besides, its nice to have backup whenever I need it. If something goes wrong, I can just have him come out and nuke everything. Its not even a problem anymore because, according to recent findings..."

" **My nuke will immediately be reversed. Whoopee.** " Kyuubi didn't sound as enthusiastic as he should have been.

"...And everything will be reset. We've used it to retry the Kakashi Incident."

Neji quirked an eyebrow. "The Kakashi Incident?"

"Yes. The Kakashi Incident," Naruto repeated.

Neji waited for Naruto to elaborate. He made it three blocks before realizing that Naruto, in fact, was not going to. Kyuubi elbowed the blonde in his side.

"Oh, right. Yeah, we did this whole thing where we tried to find out what was under Kakashi's mask. Turns out it is literally impossible to find out."

Neji turned to Naruto. "What do you mean, 'impossible'?"

"I mean its impossible." Naruto responded. "We blew up the middle of the city about eleven times, and I even Mega Rasengan Barraged it. No matter what we did, we _couldn't_ get the man to take it off. We even severed his head once."

Neji gagged.

"Eventually we just gave up. It wasn't worth the effort."

Neji regained his composure.

"Wasn't he Hokage?" Neji asked.

"Yeah, what of it?" Naruto responded.

"He had to get his face on the mountain, didn't he?"

"Well, yeah..." Naruto answered slowly. He wasn't sure where this was going.

"So… didn't he have to get his mask removed? I'm pretty sure its in the mandate for him to remove it."

Naruto balked.

"Well, yeah, it is in the mandate..." Naruto started. Neji raised his eyebrow.

"I feel like there's a 'but' in there."

"… but he still somehow got it up there."

Neji deadpanned, "you're joking."

"I'm not," responded Naruto.

"How did he..." Neji trailed off.

"I believe it had something to do with, 'its either this or Icha Icha being the National Literature.'"

"I see," Neji responded.

XxX

Its usually around here that one would chronicle the adventures of Team 7 as they undertook numerous D-ranked missions and tried their very hardest to catch Tora. However, because of the way the story is, that's going to be incredibly boring. Allow me to sum it up for you.

Sasuke was a vegetable

Sakura was a bubblegum princess.

Kakashi was a suspicious cyclops. And Naruto…

Naruto spammed the entire ordeal with clones until it was done and over with. As for Tora? Its dead. Its dead and never coming back.

Continuing…

XxX

Team Seven made their way into the room that was designated to hand out missions. Kakashi, one eye on his smut book and the other on his team, followed behind his three precious Genin. Normally this would be an easy phrase of speech to pull off, but Kakashi still had his Sharingan covered, so one eye was doing the labor of both.

These days Sakura had taken to following Naruto around on their missions. She still had a crush on Sasuke, don't get her wrong, but the boy was entirely unresponsive to anything other than extreme pain. It was easier to just waste time with Naruto, rather than force herself to talk to what amounted to a brick wall.

"So what do you think we'll get to today, Naruto?" Sakura asked. She walked with a springy gait, leaning forward slightly with her hands behind her back. It had been a few weeks since they, just barely, passed their Genin Exam, and it had sure done wonders for the girl's mood. Hanging out with Naruto had all but turned her outlook on life around. With Naruto's happy-go-lucky attitude and personality, Sakura couldn't help but have some of the boy's features rub off on her.

"Hmm, I'm not too sure, Sakura-chan." Naruto responded. He had an inkling, but it was just a guess.

" **It might be the Wave Mission**." Kyuubi yawned from inside Naruto's gut. Using a nail, the fox picked meat chunks out of his teeth. " **It did happen around now in the past**."

"I know," Naruto thought back, "but we can't let _them_ know that, can we?"

Inside the room sat three figures, the most notable of which being the aged Hokage that sat in the center seat before a long table. On his left sat Iruka Umino; the Chunin with the scar over his nose just smiled and waved as Team 7 walked in. On the Hokage's right sat an unfamiliar Chunin. His face was indiscernible as it was buried in papers.

The Hokage levied a deep laugh as the team approached. "Done with more missions today, are you Team 7? I expected nothing less of your team, Kakashi."

Said Jonin could only manage a noncommittal grunt. Tearing his eye away from the book in his hand, Kakashi spared a quick glance at Naruto before turning back to his novel.

"I don't see how you could. A member of my team has a penchant to create armies, sir."

This statement earned a chuckle from both the Hokage and Iruka, but the mirth didn't extend to the cyclops. Without a further word, Kakashi turned back to his book – a blue, hardwood covered one – and continued reading. Seeing the conversation was going nowhere else, the Hokage turned to the children.

"And how are my newest soldiers shaping up? Are you learning a lot under one of my best ninja?" the wizened man asked. Somehow, the elder shinobi known as "The Professor" had always projected a genial, grandfatherly aura. It certainly helped in instilling loyalty in his older years of being Hokage, and by the time he passed the mantle onto his successor he had already passed on from being a stern commander in the eyes of the younger generation of shinobi.

Sakura was definitely one of the generation of ninja who could barely see Hiruzen Sarutobi for the war born and raised tactician he was, and thus answered him in a jovial tune. "We're fine, Hokage-sama! Kakashi-sensei has been teaching us chakra control and teamwork exercises, as well as working us on physical training."

Hiruzen chuckled and nodded gently. He spared a quick glance at Kakashi, who had met his eye briefly before turning back to his book. Hiruzen turned to the next genin in line.

"And how are you doing, Uchiha-san?" the old man asked. Once again his tone was gentle and inviting. One would be hard pressed not to expect some sort of genjutsu. Unfortunately, such geniality had little effect on what basically amounted to a walking asparagus. Sasuke's answer was silence.

Hiruzen once again turned to Kakashi. Kakashi had met his commander's gaze once more, and once more he adopted a look of nonchalance. Inside, however, Kakashi had started to sweat.

"Sasuke-san? Did you not hear me?" Hiruzen asked again. When he was met with more silence, his one eyebrow raised. Iruka decided to pick up from here.

"Sasuke? Did you not hear your Hokage talking to you?" Iruka asked. As before, the man was met with complete silence as the Uchiha just stared off into space.

"Okay, what is wrong with him now?" Iruka asked.

Kakashi looked up from his book. "Pardon?"

"What is wrong with him this time?" Iruka rephrased. "There's always _something_ up with him. I tell you, each week was like dealing with a small soap opera with this kid."

Hiruzen raised his other eyebrow. "Explain."

"Well," Iruka started, "let's say one week he'll come in. He'd be completely fine, and arguing with Kiba or Naruto over something stupid or another. Its friendly banter, so I let them play for a bit until class starts. But then… then another day comes, and he's ignoring everyone. Even me. I swear, the female students would be so _unruly_ during those days I can't even..."

"Yes yes, that's fine Iruka," the Hokage interrupted. "So this kind of behavior isn't unusual?"

"Well, no. Not really, Hokage-sama." Iruka managed to get out.

"Then this is fine." Hiruzen stated, ending the conversation. He turned to the last genin. Truthfully, it would be the one he was most interested in. "And what of you, Naruto?"

" **Yes. And what** _ **of**_ **you, Naruto? How are you gonna answer this man, now that you're actually a Hokage yourself sent back in time?** " the Kyuubi asked.

"How the hell do you _think_ I'm gonna answer?" Naruto thought back. Immediately Naruto focused outward and on the man who amounted to being a grandfather to him. Somewhere in his mind he had still barely reigned in his joy at seeing the Hokage again, but the effect had slightly dulled. This day was not the first he had encountered the aged man. On THAT day, Naruto had cried and hugged the Hokage for about an hour, with the universe constantly resetting around him. Now, he was just slightly sentimental. Taking a deep breath, Naruto prepared his lengthy answer.

"Well, to be honest, I'm completely and totally batshit upset, Gramps."

That statement earned a few turned heads. Even the paperwork Chunin stopped his machinations for a bit.

"Excuse me?"

Naruto sighed. It seemed he was answering that question a lot lately.

"I _mean_ , that I'm disgruntled gramps."

" **Didn't know you could pronounce words bigger than two syllables, punk**." Kyuubi remarked. Naruto thought very rude words to him.

"I'm pretty damn upset." Naruto continued. "Every time I see you, I tell you that I'm actually a thirty six year old man from the future who became Hokage after settling down and having kids, and every single time you refuse to believe me. If _this_ wasn't bad enough, immediately after time resets to _just_ before I say anything, ruining the entire reason I starting talking in the first place and wasting my breath!"

Admittedly, Naruto couldn't blame them for being speechless at his tirade. It took him a minute but Hiruzen, being the leader, managed to recover.

"W-what? Naruto? What are you talking about? Are you oka-"

And then time stopped. The world turned gray, and everyone with the exception of Naruto froze where they were. In a flash of light, Neji appeared next to Naruto.

The Hyuuga turned to Naruto in supreme annoyance. His eye twitched as he leveled the blonde with a glare. "Really? Again? How many times do you need to do this?" Naruto shrugged.

"I dunno. I guess its just the most convenient way to get to you."

"Did you try, I dunno, calling for me? Sending a clone? Yelling _really_ loud? You do that a lot. Do you really feel the need to _freeze the very construct of time and space in order to have a conversation with me_?"

Naruto nodded. Neji had to repress the urge to facepalm.

"What do you need, Naruto?"

"Well," Naruto began. He moved to sit on the sofa located at the side of the room. Stretching, the boy plopped down on it and spread himself across the entirety of it. "We're about to accept the Wave Mission. Since we'll be gone for a bit of time, I thought I'd tell you about what you _can_ and _cannot_ do while we're gone." Neji tilted his head.

"Wave Mission? Is this another one of those things you did that you expect me to know? Or should I have known about it and forgot?"

"What? How could you _not_ know about the Wave Mission? It was a very big part of my life!"

"Well, excuse me for not knowing every part of your life! Believe it or not, not everything evolves around you!"

"What?" Naruto exclaimed. "Yes it does!"

Neji paused. "What? Well, um. That's pretty conceited of you." It was here that Kyuubi appeared out of Naruto's stomach. The foxy clone of Naruto appeared wreathed in orange flame in the air above Naruto, before falling on the boy. Naruto went 'oof' as the fox landed.

As soon as Kyuubi made himself comfortable, he looked at Neji. With a wide, toothy smile, the Kyuubi addressed the Hyuuga kid.

" **Actually, he's not. The world really does kind of revolve around him**."

Neji raised an eyebrow. "You too? I would've thought that you of all people would refute this."

" **Really? Why?** " The Kyuubi then cuffed Naruto around the head and brought him into an uncomfortable headlock. " **I love this kid**."

Neji had to admit the sight was weird, but soldiered through it. "Aren't you two like, really antagonistic towards each other?"

" **What? No. We're best buds**."

Neji looked at Naruto. His face was turning blue as the headlock slowly turned into a chokehold.

"I see."

" **But regardless, the boy has a point. A lot of the world's events does seem to happen in his general area.** "

"Well, yeah. But those are just coincidences."

" **Was it a coincidence when he just so happened to stumble upon Jiraiya?** "

"Well, yes. It was. Anyone could have just stumbled upon him."

" **Exactly, but no one did. Only Naruto came across that man just squatting in open daylight. What about Tsunade? What are the odds that they would stumble upon her in the exact town she was in, at the exact time Orochimaru was there, just so happen to learn the Rasengan in the** _ **exact**_ **amount of time he needed to, then convince Tsunade to return because he just so happened to remind her of her loved ones?** "

"Well, I would admit that _that_ situation is a little..."

" **And what about you? You have to admit that the fight with you was lucky**."

"Okay, listen here. He won because of _you_." Neji interrupted. Kyuubi sighed.

" **Yes, and he got me because his father was Hokage and would rather not seal me into anyone else. Incredible and world changing things have been happening around him** _ **since he was born**_ **. I'm pretty sure the world revolves around him**." The Kyuubi then stopped to gesture around the room.

" **Even now, the situation calls for examination. The gods and the very powers that be created** _ **an entirely new world for the sole purpose of having Naruto relive his life**_ **. This world quite literally revolves around him, as his slightest deviation will come it crashing down around him. They then teleport you to us while they reset it. Its not hard, human. The world, before and after we were brought here, revolves around this blonde idiot**."

Neji nodded. There wasn't much he could really argue against that. Thinking things over a bit, the Hyuuga turned back to the fox.

"Kyuubi?" Neji asked.

" **Yes, human?** " the fox responded.

"Could you let Naruto go now? I think we need him for the world to reset."

" **Oh, right.** " And just like that Naruto was allowed to breathe again.

Naruto spoke between gasps of air, "You… dirty… son… of a bitch..."

" **You know you love me**."

"If… I had… three Rasengans… and you… Sasuke… and Madara where all… in the same… room..."

" **Yes, human? Spit it out. Come on. I know you can do it...** "

"I… I would… I would use all three..."

" **Yes? Come on boy. You can do it. Who's a good ninja? You are! Yes you are!** "

"You know what? Fuck… it." And just like that two Rasengan's were charged, smothered into one, then smothered into a third Rasengan made on the spot. The large and wildly rotating sphere teetered on the edge of instability, before being crushed into a fist. Smiling manically, Naruto punched Kyuubi with all the stored energy. The fox boy was sent careening out through the village.

Neji raised an eyebrow. "You know, now that I'm used to it and know the nonexistent consequences, that's actually rather hilarious."

"Tell me… about it..." Naruto gasped out.

"Wait. You could barely breathe, but you had enough energy to send the Kyuubi flying over – and in some cases _through_ – the village?"

Naruto, who had still not regained his breathe, looked at Neji as if he were stupid.

"What are you… talking about? Rasengan _is_ how I breathe."

Neji could only stare.


	7. Chapter 7: Wave Mission: Start

_**Ha. You thought that one scene from a couple chapters ago was just a random segue didn't you?**_

 _ **Prepare to be wrong.**_

* * *

Naruto sighed as he pulled the rope tighter. Before him lie the Demon Brothers: two chuunin from the village of the Hidden Mist. Well, former chuunin, if their scratched headbands were any indicator. If Naruto's memory was right, which he was almost sure it wasn't, these two specific brothers were under the employment of one Momochi Zabuza. The very same Mist ninja would be his first major battle.

" **You know the one eyed freak is going to be suspicious of this, right?** " Kyuubi asked from within him. Naruto repressed the urge to roll his eyes. Thinking on it, the blonde found he had no real reason to repress such an action, then rolled his eyes anyway.

"It doesn't matter," Naruto responded. "The worst he can do is find out, and then we can finally have what we want: a confidante in this crazy, fucked up world." Kyuubi rolled his eyes. Naruto somehow felt that.

" **You do realize that this, 'crazy, fucked up world** ' **is, for all intents and purposes of the very gods themselves, an exact replica of your past?** "

"Kyuubi. In my past a grown man with a cleaver, no eyebrows, and the bushiest, baggiest parachute pants this side of Fire Country is going to attempt to divorce my head from my body while I'm a child. In my present, that sentence made perfect sense. I'm pretty sure I'm officially allowed to announce this place for what it is. 'Fucked up'."

Kyuubi let out a barking laugh in Naruto's gut. The action, though somewhat unwilling, brought a smile to Naruto's face as well. This was the scene Kakashi bore witness to as he strolled out of the forest to the side of the path where Naruto stood with his catch. Book in hand, Kakashi raised an eyebrow at what he saw before him.

"Most Genin don't find enjoyment in their first ninja fight," the man stated. With a snap, the Jonin closed his book and made his way over to his student. With a single hand, Kakashi grasped the rope tying the Demon brothers together and lifted it into the air, before hurling it into a tree. The two brothers grunted; they hit the tree rather hard.

Naruto donned a smile. "Its not every day I get to show off how awesome I am!" he screamed. One hand reached to scratch the back of his neck, and with it, the look was complete. Naruto looked the same as he always acted back when he was a child, and sure enough, the act would fool most people.

Kakashi was not most people.

"Yes, quite. You're a bit _more_ awesome than you should be though," the cyclops stated. Before Naruto could make heads of this however, the taller man had moved away, ready to interrogate the hostages. Naruto sighed. Guess they were in the clear a bit longer then. Turning, Naruto could see Sakura standing guard over the near comatose form of their last team member. The blonde smiled.

"That was a good punch, Sakura." Naruto stated as he walked over to the girl. Sakura smiled, but her eyes darted over to the two ninja currently wetting themselves before Kakashi.

"Is it over? Are we done?" she asked. Naruto nodded.

"Yeah. Kakashi-sensei is having a talk with them. Told ya' he wasn't dead."

Sakura relaxed a bit. With a sheepish expression, the girl sheathed her kunai. "Yeah. But its not every day you see a professional Substitution in action. Thank you, by the way. About the punch."

Naruto chuckled. "Well, its not every day you see a professional punch in action. I think it sent him halfway across the path."

Naruto wasn't joking either. The man was sent careening across the battlefield with the speed of a missile. He hit a tree and slid to the ground unconscious. He was out of the fight until Naruto was done cleaning up the other brother. The reason the punch was so strong? The man attempted to take out Sasuke.

Sakura smirked. With an ease of recent practice, she mirrored Naruto's chuckle. "Don't exaggerate, idiot." She then playfully punched Naruto in the shoulder. Naruto had to rub his arm afterwards.

Around here Kakashi had returned from his "talk." His face was grim as he approached his team.

"Listen, team. I have some bad news," the cyclops stated. His eye focused on their charge: a bridge builder they were tasked to escort back home. The man had immediately hid when the fighting broke out. This somehow worked. "Our little friend happens to be the target of some very dangerous and high profile people. Does 'Gato of Gato Industries' ring any bells, Mr. Tazuna?"

Tazuna had the decency to look guilty.

"It might," the man slurred out. He was slightly tipsy. Kakashi's eye narrowed.

"Well, it certainly rings a bell to me. Gato, of his self named industry, happens to be one of the most wealthy men in the world. He has enough money to pay the Village to send their most trained ninja to shovel manure and not even have a dip in his resources. This is the man who has set his sights on you. From where these two cannon fodder have come," Kakashi then threw a thumb over his shoulder at the two ninja who were, in a word, traumatized, "there are definitely more. As the team leader, I cannot in good conscious allow my team to continue on a mission of such lethality, especially on their very first C-ranked mission. _Especially_ what you've paid us." Tazuna adopted a look of absolute horror.

"But… but you can't just abandon me now!" the old man exclaimed, his voice clearer now that he was concerned. Kakashi didn't seem to care.

"I can and I definitely will. You may not notice, but I have my precious little Genin to worry about as well. I can't have my first team just die on me on their first actual mission. My credibility would be tarnished forever."

Tazuna's eyes widened. "Wha- What? Is your credibility worth more to you than the lives of countless men, women and children? All of which have been suffering half their lives under the rule of a tyrannical dictator?"

Kakashi, who had went back to reading his book, turned his eye back to Tazuna. "I was, no, I **am** a professional killer. These three children? They are training to become professional killers. I have singlehandedly taken the lives of more people in a small handful of missions than you have in your entire little town. I'm sorry Mr. Tazuna, but making the decision to forfeit lives is no new experience to me. So to answer your question, yes. My credibility is _definitely_ more valuable to me." Kakashi turned his eye back to his book. "I value the importance of a human life as much as the next guy, but random lives in a random town mean vastly less to me than the lives of my three little cuties. You may not know this, but even these three are high priority in my Village. That doesn't matter much to me though. It also just so happens that among them, one of them I happen to like."

Around here, Naruto excitedly started raising his hand. "Is it me, sensei?"

Kakashi eyed him. "No where even close."

"S-so is it me, sensei?" Sakura tentatively asked. Kakashi shook his head.

"Nope, try again."

"There's only one option left, sensei." Naruto whined.

"Try again~" Kakashi sang.

"Is it me?"

"You already asked that, Naruto."

"Its worth a second shot."

"It's Sasuke." Sakura stated. She didn't want to start the two on another rant.

"Yes. Good girlie," Kakashi drawled. He complimented this with the turning of a page.

"What? Why?" Naruto asked.

"Because he's quiet. You'd be surprised how far that goes."

"Ugh," Naruto grunted. He shuffled off. Kakashi turned back to the bridge builder.

"Back to you. I'm terribly sorry. I really am," the Jonin started. His voice held absolutely no sorrow. "But I'm going to have to decli-"

"I guess that Icha Icha Storm debut is going to be put on hold again." Tazuna grumbled.

"… Excuse me?" Kakashi asked. His voice rose an octave or two.

"Icha Icha Storm. The next Icha Icha volume coming out? Yeah, it was meant to debut in Wave, the setting being based on my hometown. With the way Gato Corps has been draining the economy, it couldn't exactly make a proper debut. I had _thought_ that with you guys helping us, we would free my country in no time, but it appears I was wrong… Oh well." Tazuna grumbled once more. With a flourish, the man shook his wine bottle to gauge the amount of liquid still in it. Sneakily, Tazuna threw an eye over to the Jonin as the man contemplated his words. Kakashi was still, almost silent even as he turned the words over in his head.

After a minute, Kakashi's mind was made. "Team, we're continuing the mission."

Sakura blanched. "What?"

"I _said_. We're continuing the miss-"

"No, I know what you said." Sakura clarified. "What I meant was _why_. What happened to protecting our fragile, innocent lives and caring for your favorite student?" Kakashi made a dismissive motion with his hand.

"I just said those things to get Tazuna off my back. I don't care too much either way about you guys. However..." Kakashi then turned a mean, one eyed glare to the back of Naruto, who was studying a nearby tree. "Because of one of you, I am now suspiciously low on my storage of novels with no actual way of replenishing them. I think saving the town would be a nice forward payment towards getting free issues for life."

Tazuna chuckled at the man. "Your bluntness sure is rough, boy." Kakashi smiled. This action wasn't evident anywhere on his body besides his eye.

"Please, sir. I'm twenty-six years old."

Sakura was getting fed up with their actions and decided to reinsert herself into the conversation. "Wait, hold on. What if the rest of those ninjas actually kill us? Don't we get a say in this?" Kakashi rolled his eye.

"No, you don't. But I'll humor you. Let's have a vote by show of hands. Majority wins."

"Sounds like a plan." Sakura voiced.

" **Kit, vote against it. It'll be funny to see how the gods handle us going back to the village**." Kyuubi stated from where he and Naruto were eavesdropping.

"Already on it," Naruto thought back.

"All those who want to continue the mission, raise your hand." Kakashi stated in a singsong vote. He then raised his hand, an action not mirrored by Naruto, Sakura or Sasuke. Nodding his head, Kakashi continued.

"Now, all of you who wish to go back, raise your hand." To this, Naruto and Sakura raised their hand, to which both Kakashi and Sasuke did nothing. Briefly, all four other people on the road stared at the comatose boy who responded to neither vote.

"I've been meaning to ask, but is that boy okay?" Tazuna asked. His question was dismissed immediately by all three of the other ninja.

"So the votes have been cast." Kakashi drawled. "And it seems that we are moving ahead with the mission." Both Naruto and Sakura did a double take.

"What? How the hell did you manage that?" Naruto asked incredulously. "It was our two to your one!"

"Yeah, what the hell, sensei?" Sakura added. Kakashi just nodded his head, a pensive look on his face.

"Yes, indeed. But as your group leader and teacher, my vote holds more than yours do. With my vote counting twice of yours, and you both voting against me, we come out at a clear tie." Naruto balked.

"So how the hell does that mean that we're going ahead?"

"Well," Kakashi started, "we can't very well just stay here in this road forever, which means we need a veritable tiebreaker. Do you have anyone in mind?"

Naruto and Sakura looked at each other, before looking around the clearing. First their eyes fell on Tazuna, who stood behind Kakashi with a gleaming smile on his face. Shaking their heads, they turned slowly to the last member of their team, who stood stock still behind them.

He was not moving.

"N-no. We don't, sensei." Naruto muttered.

"I see." Kakashi drawled. He turned another page in his book. "Well, it just so happens that I do. Mr. Tazuna?"

"Yes, Sir Ninja?"

"What do you think we should do?"

"I think we should move ahead, Sir Ninja." Tazuna responded.

"Very well, my good man." Kakashi answered. He looked to his two students who stood with stock expressions on their face.

"It looks like we're moving ahead."

XxX

Naruto lounged over the side of the boat as Team Seven, along with Tazuna, rowed their way towards port in the country of Wave. Idly, the boy played with the water as the man in charge of the boat kept them moving steadily forward. Unbeknownst to the rest of the people on the boat, Naruto was fiddling with a low level water technique Iruka, the future one, had him learn. The waves, as long as his hand dipped in the saltwater every so often, would veer slightly off to the side of the boat. Naruto sighed.

"I'm bored." Sakura rolled her eyes.

"We know, Naruto. You've said it thirteen times already."

"Well make this fourteen. I'm _bored_ Sakura. Is there nothing else for us to do while we sit here?"

"You can sleep," Kakashi suggested from his point near the helm. His eye was buried in a book as he lounged near the front. Naruto shook his head.

"You'd probably leave me behind when we dock if I did that. Next try."

"You can shut up," Sakura suggested. Naruto rolled his eyes.

"If that was something I knew how to do I'd have done it by now. Next?"

"Did you try expanding that jutsu you're using?" Kakashi asked. Naruto's eyes flashed over to Kakashi. His single eye was still on the book in front of him. If asked though, Naruto could swear the cloth covering his other eye was just slightly out of place. The blonde raised an eyebrow.

"No. I believe its just right. We're almost there anyway." Naruto responded. In response, Kakashi managed a "hmm" before turning a page. Right after this interaction, the boat slowed before coming to a stop. The rower let out a sigh of relief upon docking.

"Phew," the rower exhaled, "that was a much easier ride than I thought. Usually the trip is much more turbulent."

Kakashi and Naruto's eyes met.

"Yeah. Ninjas tend to have more… fortunate bouts with nature." Kakashi drawled.

"Well, whatever the reason, we've reached the secret port earlier than expected."

Naruto looked around. The "secret port" amounted to some pieces of wood haphazardly nailed together near the river. The boat didn't actually touch it, but the very idea of the ninjas disembarking was enough to cause the contraption to wobble intensely. Naruto stared.

"Are you sure that's sa-"

"Entirely safe. Been used forever."

"How long is forever?" Sakura asked.

"Ever since Gato started oppressing us seriously."

"And how long has that been?" the boat rower scratched his chin.

"For about as long as I can remember."

"And when was the last time it was fixed up?" Naruto asked.

"Do you really think we can afford fixing things around here?"

"I see." Naruto and Sakura deadpanned together. The rower rolled his eyes.

"Listen, don't complicate things. Just use the secret port unless you want to fight all of Gato Corps at once-"

" **I mean, we probably can**." Kyuubi yawned.

"Probably?" Naruto thought.

" **Wait, we aren't using handicaps?** "

"-you ninja can stand on water anyway, can't you?" the rower finished. At this, Kakashi spared a look at his three students. Overlooking the suspicious stare he sent Naruto's way, doubt clouded his eye in regards to the other two. Especially Sasuke.

Honestly, Kakashi was happy the boy could breath, let alone walk.

"We'll take a rain check on that. Team? Off the rickety death boat and onto the rickety death plank. Stat." Naruto and Sakura grumbled as they followed their leader's words.

Sasuke… breathed. It was becoming more and more fascinating by the day. The Genin debated on how he functioned without them.

"I think he acts on primal instincts." Naruto stated.

" **You** **know what** **that** **is** **?** " Kyuubi asked.

"Of course."

" **Are you sure**?"

"What? Yes, why?"

" **You're excited to see a man who is even more excited to kill you**."

"When was the last time someone _wasn't_ excited to kill me?"

" **And therein lies the problem**."

"Nah, he just kind of bumbles around his house until I place food in front of him." Sakura commented, oblivious of the conversation happening in Naruto's head. "He'll eat when he's hungry, but he won't prepare anything. He'll literally just cram the first thing he can grab in his mouth." Naruto stared.

"I don't think I want to know how you came across _that_ information." Sakura shrugged.

"I don't think you want to know what else I did."

With a shiver, Naruto agreed with his teammate. Deciding he needed to know _nothing_ else, the boy continued on walking towards Tazuna's house. Yeah, he kinda just dropped the conversation like a stone. Good thing too, because as soon as he did there was rustling in the trees. Both Naruto and Kakashi turned to the noise.

In a bush, leaves on a lower branch bristled for a bit before a snow rabbit emerged, eyes darting back and forth in fear. Kakashi turned away, deeming the threat inconsequential, but Naruto stared at it a moment longer. After a minute, he too turned away.

"Kyuubi?"

" **Yes, brat**?"

"You're a fox right?"

The Kyuubi responded, but it was full of such sarcasm that it didn't translate into text well. Naruto rolled his eyes.

"I meant that since you're a fox, you hunt rabbits, right?"

The Kyuubi, who was considerably less excited that his sarcasm was unheeded, replied. " **Y** **es. Granted I'm not a** _ **normal**_ **fox by any means, I have tried my hand at the craft**."

"How did it go?" Naruto asked.

" **About as well as you would expect**."

"Which was?"

" **I burned both it and the entire forest to the ground**."

"Oh." Naruto deadpanned.

" **Why?** "

"Cause, I'm pretty sure that something is wrong with that bunny. I mean, I _know_ that its Zabuza's attempt at a distraction, but still, it just seems wrong. Its really bad. Was he trying to tip us off?"

Kyuubi shrugged. One couldn't fathom how Naruto interpreted the action. " **Maybe Mist ninja are just bad at stealth**."

"What? Impossible. They are the original creators of the silent kill technique."

" **So**?" Kyuubi asked. " **That doesn't mean anything. You usually** _ **know**_ **when a Kiri ninja is going to silently kill you, so it doesn't even matter. Just because the actual murder is silent is irrelevant. Its not exactly stealthy to drown an entire area in mist to silently kill someone. Pretty sure anyone that survives would know its you**."

"Well maybe that's how they do it," Naruto started, "No one will know its you if there is no one to know."

" **And that, my friend, is why I like the Mist**." Naruto chuckled.

"Really? Are you sure? And here I thought it was because of their 'Bloody Mist' traditions."

" **What the hell is that?** " Kurama asked.

"They used to have the students kill other students in order to graduate as a ninja. Zabuza took it one step further and killed his whole class. I think he was the only one in that generation of Genin to actually become a shinobi."

At this realization Kyuubi was quiet for a bit.

Only a bit though.

" **Naruto** ," the fox rumbled.

"Hmm?"

" **I have to meet this man**."

"Can do." Naruto responded as he ducked. As he did so, a giant mass of solid metal came spiraling out of the forest. Spinning with a "whirring" sound, the sword just barely missed cleaving off the head of the five travelers, with Kakashi having grabbed Tazuna and Sakura, and Naruto ducking himself.

Sasuke hadn't moved at all. Apparently this was not in the man's calculations because the blade still missed him.

Naruto turned on Kakashi with a scandalized look on his face. "Sensei, what gives?"

Kakashi stared at the boy.

"Hmm?"

"You didn't even try to save me!"

"Oh," Kakashi answered, "my bad."

"' _Your bad_ '? You almost let me and Sasuke die and all you have to say is ' _your bad_ '?"

Kakashi scratched the back of his head. "Well, yeah. You're both fine."

"It could've _killed_ us!" Naruto yelled.

"No," Kakashi responded, "it could've killed _you_. Sasuke was fine."

"Uh, ahem?" Zabuza grunted from his place on his sword. "Aren't you guys forgetting something?"

"In a minute," Naruto stated. He waved his hand at the man dismissively, his attention never leaving Kakashi. "Back to you. Yeah, it missed Sasuke, but _I could have still been hit_."

"A fact that I'm sure would be fatal had you not dodged." Kakashi drawled.

"Yeah, it would have been. What if I hadn't?"

"Well, its a good thing you did. Now that you mention it, even _I_ barely noticed it in time, and yet you went down before even I did. Very curious."

"Kakashi, please don't tell me we're doing this right now." Naruto said. The statement was full of exasperation.

"Oh we are definitely doing this right now," Kakashi drawled. His voice and tone was still bored, but it carried with it a hint of probing, nauseating teasing. "Its 'sensei' by the way."

Naruto rolled his eyes.

"Are you seriously telling me you almost let me die because of some crazy suspicion you have about me?"

"It was a risk I was willing to take."

"Seriously?" Naruto screamed. His face then turned blank. "Oh my Sage. You're actually doing this right here, right now. With a deranged criminal staring down our necks, you're doing this."

Zabuza, who had by now been just standing on his cleaver for the couple or so minutes they were arguing, decided that maybe he should sit this one out. He discreetly signaled his accomplice to do the same. After hearing the comment about him being a "deranged criminal" he looked down at himself. Did he really come off that way at first glance?

Was it the parachute pants?

"Hey girlie." Zabuza called out. Sakura turned to him. She was slightly apprehensive, but seeing that he only wanted to talk worked to ease her nerves slightly about the man who had just tried to kill her.

"Yes?" Sakura replied. Zabuza looked at her in surprise.

"I was talked about the black haired one, but you'll do." Zabuza commented. Sakura had to hold in a laugh. "Tell me, what about me makes me seem like a deranged criminal?"

Sakura had to seriously wonder about the man's sanity.

"You mean besides the fact that you just tried to behead us all?" the Genin asked. Unfortunately Zabuza didn't learn about sarcasm in his youth. He was too busy killing all his friends.

"Yes," the man stated simply. Sakura didn't know what to think of that. Instead she looked the man over. Her eyes quickly focused on the lower half of the man's body, and her answer suddenly seemed clear.

"It's the parachute pants." Sakura commented without hesitation. The man slumped in defeat.

"I knew it," Zabuza sighed. With his left hand he picked at the material. "Well, _I_ think they're cool."

Back with the sensei and student, things were starting to escalate.

"I don't care what you think, Kakashi! Don't just suddenly leave me to die because you have some _hunch_ that I'm suddenly a lot more skilled than I seem! What do you even care for, anyway?"

"Well," Kakashi hummed, "what if you were a spy? My cute little Genin shouldn't give me a challenge in any way, and yet here you are. I have to be careful."

"Aargh!" Naruto screamed, his hands reaching to tug on his hair. "I already told you that I'm not!"

"That's exactly the kind of thing that a spy would say."

"AAARGH!"

Sakura, who couldn't bear much more of this, turned back to Zabuza.

"So what about you? Why are you here?" she asked. It was Zabuza's turn to look at her like she was stupid.

"I'm here to kill you." Zabuza stated simply. Sakura didn't even give it a second thought.

"Well, of course. But I mean, why are you doing it? I know you're not doing it for fun."

"Well of course not." Zabuza replied. "I'm doing it for the same reason every other ninja in the world does it. Money. I need money to achieve my goals. This was an easy way to do it."

"Well, surely its not the _only_ way to do it. There has to be easier ways to earn money as a rogue ninja than by killing people."

"There are," Zabuza answered. "But you have to keep in mind that I enjoy killing as well."

By now Naruto's screams were starting to become deafening. He had taken to staring down his teacher, but it seemed to not be working, as the man kept the ever nonchalant expression he was known for strong.

"Then why don't you just explain it to me?" Kakashi asked, his eyes half lidded.

"I already _told_ you why I can't do that!" Naruto yelled. "No matter how much I try to tell you, it wouldn't _matter_ in the long run! You wouldn't remember it after I told it to you!" Kakashi tilted his head.

"I highly doubt that. My mind is a lot stronger than it seems. I remember things from my childhood fairly well."

"That's not an accomplishment." Naruto responded. "Your childhood was terrible." Kakashi narrowed an eye at him.

"That's a rather peculiar thing that you shouldn't know." Naruto rolled his eyes.

"No, its not. _Everyone_ from your generation had shitty lives. That's not a unique thing." Kakashi was forced to nod his head to that.

"Still, I would rather like to hear it."

"Well that's tough shit."

"I see. Well then, don't expect me to save you."

Naruto muffled his screams by burying his head in his jacket. Kakashi turned back to Zabuza.

"And what in the Six Paths of the Sage do you want?" the Jounin asked. Zabuza, who was now in a deep conversation with the pink haired Genin, turned his attention to the scarecrow.

"Are you done?" Zabuza asked. He had his head propped on his knee as he sat on his blade, which was imbedded into a tree.

"I think we're more or less ready." Kakashi then stopped to look over his team.

Naruto was still screaming into his jacket. Nodding, Kakashi turned his head to Sakura. She had started to exchange information with Zabuza before he interrupted. With two members down, Kakashi started to look for the third, before immediately stopping himself.

He already knew where Sasuke was. Retrieving a pebble from the road, Kakashi blindly threw it behind him. It went _thump_ off of something before falling back to the ground. Kakashi sighed. Of course. Sasuke was exactly where Kakashi knew he was.

In the exact same place he left them.

"Yeah, we're ready." Kakashi drawled. Immediately he pulled out a kunai, to which Zabuza responded by pulling his sword from the tree with one hand. Shortly after, Naruto and Sakura made their way behind Kakashi and next to Sasuke.

The two higher level ninja stared each other down, before a massive amount of killing intent washed over the grounds from both ends. Zabuza stared forlornly at the overall indifference the Genin were handling the situation with. He stared back at Kakashi.

"It seems your little brats are more worth than they seem. To not crumble under my killing intent means that they're at least half of a ninja." At this, Kakashi fished a look over his shoulder at the children. Sure enough, none of them were phased.

"Eh, I've had worse." Naruto stated. He had his hands folded behind his head, looking a perfect picture of nonplussed.

"I just had a rather interesting conversation with you," Sakura commented. She had a slip of paper in her hand with Zabuza's information on it. "Its hard to be afraid of someone after that."

Sasuke said nothing.

"Is that kid alright?" Zabuza asked. "I mean, I thought at first he just had the skill necessary to dodge my attack, but at this point I'm starting to think he's just dead."

He was promptly ignored.

"Let's do this, Demon of the Hidden Mist." Kakashi grunted, and just like that the battle was on. The first thing Zabuza did was flip through one handed seals. Ending on a dime, the Ninja of the Seven Swordsman chuckled darkly.

"Its time I show you my secret technique." the man muttered. Glee was apparent in his eyes. Hidden Mist's most famous ability! With this, Kakashi of the Sharingan, your time here is u-"

Was all the man was able to say before a kunai of pure, unbridled energy literally exploded from the tree lines. It shone in a myriad of colors as it quite literally pierced through the air on an unimpeded flight. The kunai, as if noticing Zabuza, impossibly changed its flight path and arced in a ninety degree angle. Settling on blue, the kunai crackled with limitless electric energy and chakra before piercing to through the man's leg. Zabuza fell to the ground in pain, shortly before crying out once more as the latent electricity of the blow coursed through him, rendering him unconscious immediately.

The kunai never once stopped to observe any of this though. Its work here done, it once again shone in a myriad of color before blasting through the treeline once more.

Its bloodlust would not be sated here today.

Back with the group, all the gathered ninja could do was gape. Naruto was the first to recover.

"Oh, so _that's_ where that kunai went!" he chirped. Kyuubi was less enthusiastic.

" **How the hell did it even get out here**?" he asked. " **We threw it in the complete opposite direction**!"


	8. Chapter 8: Wave Mission: Go

_**Hi guys. Sorry about the late update. Its a big one this time, so I guess it counts as two.**_

 _ **Hope you haven't been getting comfortable anywhere. The real chaos starts now.**_

* * *

It was an interesting sight, really. One couldn't say there was often an occasion where Jonin Kakashi Hatake, the Copy Ninja himself, was adequately stumped as to what he was to do.

Before him stood his three cute little Genin. They all, with the addition of Sasuke by proxy of him always being so, stood with apt attention and obedient silence as they awaited their sensei's orders as to what they would be instructed to do.

This was, of course, a special occasion. The students wouldn't be so rapt and attentive otherwise. Shortly after Zabuza was incapacitated by the odd rogue kunai, a Hunter Ninja from the Hidden Mist appeared and swiftly made off with the missing ninja and his sword. Kakashi, who was sufficiently mystified by the spectacle that he had just borne witness to, could not appropriately gauge the situation before him. As such he was unable to pick out how odd the "Hunter Ninja" was.

It wasn't until they were halfway back to Tazuna's house that Kakashi had put two and two together.

So now the Team had what amounted to a steadily recovering borderline S-ranked ninja and his borderline A-ranked assistant running around, and only one available ninja to stand up to such a threat. Kakashi wasn't a gambling man. It never was one of his vices. However, constant bouts with Gai had taught the man that engaging in games of chance with less than complete assurance that you were going to win was a fool's errand.

Especially when the stake was your life.

So with his odds of winning a fight with a man slightly above his pay grade and a child slightly below it being ridiculously low, Kakashi decided to teach his cute little students some skills.

The better they were, the better _cannon fodder_ they could become after all.

The problem with this was that Kakashi had not an earthly idea what to teach his students. He… never really had to teach before. He spent his few years of active ninja duty in ANBU, where most everyone had already known everything they really needed to know. The most he had to teach them were teamwork exercises to help them refine plans they already made.

Even his time under the Fourth Hokage wasn't helpful to his current predicament. Kakashi was, simply put, a genius. He highly doubted he could teach the three before him the same way he learned his necessary skills. At some point he might have seen a little bit of himself in Sasuke, but…

If Kakashi was able to get _anything_ through to that boy, it would be a personal victory. The boy was barely alive.

So that left his two other Genin. One was basically a walking chakra battery. The kid had endurance to match senior ninjas in their prime.

Yes. Senior ninjas. As in plural. Naruto was worth several veteran ninjas by himself. He, if polished and perfected after years of brutal skill and technique being beaten into him, could possibly become the most talented and awe inspiring shinobi the world had ever known.

Kakashi had estimated they had about a week. Not optimistic thinking.

The other Genin had the exact opposite problem. Sakura was book smart like you wouldn't believe, and could pick up complicated problems and abstract or poorly explained concepts and apply them, at least in theory.

The problem with her was that while she could apply these circumstances perfectly in theory, she had difficulty pulling them off in practice. Her physical conditioning, in a single word at least, sucked. Even after all the training he forced her through, she was barely more than simply adequate as far as Genin went. Considering what she was before he got to her, he considered even that a personal achievement. This left Kakashi with a serious dilemma.

How the hell was he to train these kids to take on opponents even he was considering taking seriously?

"So… sensei? Are you going to talk or are you going to impersonate Sasuke some more?" Naruto asked. He had managed to stand still and allow his sensei to ruminate on his own for a bit, but even he had his limits.

" **Its reassuring to believe that even after all those years, you're still basically the same**." The Kyuubi commented from his seal. Naruto frowned.

"What do you mean?"

" **Even after becoming a father, Hokage, and husband, you still have the patience of a burning log**."

"Do you have any idea how long it takes a log to burn?"

" **Do you**?"

Naruto was unable to answer.

" **I thought not.** **And why exactly don't you know?** "

"It took FOREVER Kurama!"

" **Shh. I know, child**."

Back with Kakashi, the man was rubbing his chin through his mask in an attempt to come up with an idea. Finally settling on one, he looked up, slightly apprehensively, at his team.

"Do you guys know how to climb a tree?"

The man was met with a set of stares.

"Uh, yeah?" Naruto answered slowly. "Who doesn't?"

Sakura raised her hand.

"Besides Sakura?" Naruto clarified.

"Well, whether or not you know how to do it physically, the kind of tree climbing I was referring to was this." Kakashi stated, before walking off to the nearest tree. They were in a field behind Tazuna's house, and as such had access to the island's forest that was apparently situated behind it. Approaching the tree, Kakashi took a second to look it over.

The tree was tall, easily 30 feet at the minimum. Its trunk was thick, at least thick enough for all of the genin to have to stretch their arms around it to cover it. It was perfect for what he had planned. Turning around, Kakashi took a stern look at his students before turning back to the tree and planting a foot on its bark. Then, with the difficulty one would have with taking a stroll in a park, Kakashi placed his other foot as well and started walking up it. Sakura was stunned.

"Sensei? How are you doing that?" Sakura asked, her eyes alight. Running up, Sakura stood merely a couple feet from the base of the tree, her eyes glued to her teacher's feet. Kakashi turned and gave the girl an eye smile.

"This is a technique known to most in the Village as 'tree climbing'. Tell me, do you guys know about chakra?" their teacher asked. Sakura nodded vigorously.

"Do you want the long version or the short one?" Sakura asked. Naruto stared at her.

"I think we all know about chakra by now," Naruto answered, "the short version should be enough."

Sakura answered this by sticking her tongue out at him.

"Well then, since we're all experts here," Sakura started, "chakra is the manifestation of our physical energies given form through special kneading and techniques acquired by ninjas over a very long time. It is present in the bodies of every living thing, and therefore anyone with the right training can use it to interact with the world around them." Sakura finished her little speech with a bow.

"Was that good sensei?"

"It was excellent, Sakura. Thank you." Kakashi responded. He then turned his attention back to the group as a whole. "Chakra is a wonderful resource that we as shinobi utilize everyday. For all except a very select few, chakra is an indispensable weapon, tool and companion. With it, we can do many marvelous things, such as healing wounds both grave and inconsequential, create terrifying artifices of war and summon extraordinary creatures."

"Or walk on trees apparently," Naruto commented.

"Or walk on trees," Kakashi mimicked. He rubbed his temple. Naruto had a way with words.

"So here's what we're doing today. We're going to learn to walk on trees with chakra."

"How do we do that, sensei?" Sakura asked.

"Simple," Kakashi answered. He lifted a finger. "First, you concentrate chakra to the soles of your feet. When you have the right amount, you simply place your foot and start walking. Now, this isn't exactly easy, as the exact amount changes for everyone, but once you get the hang of it you'll..."

"Wow, this is easy!" Sakura called from her place atop a branch a few meters up the tree from where Kakashi stood. He stared at her.

"When did you..."

"You're right though, sensei. My stamina sucks. I'm a little tired just getting this far." Sakura continued. Her breathing was slightly labored, but she was otherwise excited. Kakashi nodded.

"Well, I should have expected as much from you, Sakura. But as for the rest of yo-"

Kakashi was cut off by Naruto falling from a branch even further up. The boy hit the ground with an "oomph." Kakashi stared.

"Okay, what?"

Naruto rubbed his head. He had fallen on it. "Yeah, sensei. That's harder than it seems!"

" **Like your head** ," Kyuubi commented. " **Good thing you landed on it. Nothing of value was threatened**."

Kakashi scratched his head. "So you two either did know about it, or you're much smarter than I gave you credit for."

"I like to think its a little bit of both, sensei." Naruto shouted from his place halfway back up the tree. He had tackled the exercise again as soon as he had "failed". Kakashi gave him an accusatory look.

"Yes. Though some of you may have more in one category than the other," Kakashi muttered. When Naruto shrugged his shoulders and continued his trek up the tree, Kakashi had to settle on the fact that he just wasn't going to get to the bottom of that boy just yet. The teacher then turned to the last member of their team. As expected, he hadn't moved from his place at all, instead choosing to stand impossibly still. His eyes were completely glazed over as he stared ahead. Kakashi couldn't guess what was going through the boy's mind.

The Jonin turned back to his functional students. "Alright gang. Since you guys are obviously good enough to do the tree climbing technique, we're going to be going more in depth in your training."

Naruto, now genuinely, fell out of his tree. Since he had reached quite high in his second "attempt", he now had quite a ways to fall. As such, flipping over in midair and using a chakra coated hand to slow his technique, then balance himself, was rather easy, and before anyone could quite tell the boy was upright on the side of the tree.

Yeah, that ending made sense.

"Wait, what?" Naruto thought. His mind was racing.

" **What's wrong, brat?** " the Kyuubi asked, genuinely concerned. As absent-minded and simple-headed as his host may be, he rarely lost control of well practiced techniques to something as trivial as misplaced concentration.

"That… definitely didn't happen last time," Naruto responded. Kyuubi, as his portal to the outside world was through Naruto's perspective, could not actually see the boy's face from inside of him. This being the case, he could still somehow detect the quiver in his host's eyes as he stared down at his former teacher. He was suitably alarmed.

" **So?** " the Kyuubi asked. " **What does this mean?** "

"It means that things are _changing_ Kyuubi. I thought things weren't supposed to change!"

" **Huh** ," Kyuubi responded. " **I'm pretty sure they weren't. I wonder what happened.** "

* * *

The Sage worked frantically, bending chakra and the very rules of reality around him as the powers that be did the same. He wasn't sure how, but this problem had escalated so far out of control that even he was being contracted to help out. The timeless wonder zone he had installed himself in fluctuated and pulsed every so often in response to the raw amount of power that was being tossed around, but somehow, in some way…

Hagoromo knew that it just wasn't enough.

* * *

"It probably doesn't matter." Naruto stated after a short pause. "I was getting bored of seeing and doing all the same things twice. It could be a nice little change."

" **Your nonchalant attitude towards potentially vital information never ceases to amaze me, boy** ," the Kyuubi growled. This being said, the fox had just turned over and started to fall asleep in his spot inside Naruto.

"Please Kyuubi. I'm thirty six."

" **Right now you're barely a man. Start complaining when you hit puberty**."

"Kyuubi, we both know what happens whenever I hit something. It hits back. Usually harder than I hit it."

" **Mhm**." Kyuubi muttered. His eyes were already starting to droop.

"Alright then," Naruto responded. "Enjoy the teenage hormones running through both my system and yours."

Kyuubi's eyes flashed open as a dawning horror spread across his face. Naruto cut off their link right there, but before he did he could hear the screams of anguish. They calmed his nerves a bit.

Naruto looked back at Kakashi. During the boy's conversation with his tenant, the teacher had taken to gauging the reactions of his students. He looked at Sakura first, and Naruto could tell the man was satisfied with her reaction. Now however, as he looked to Naruto, he awaited a response.

"Well, Naruto? What do you think?" Kakashi asked. Naruto grinned.

"Training is always good, sensei! What are we going to do next?"

"Well, since you already know the tree climbing technique," Kakashi started, "the next course of action is the water walking technique."

"The water walking technique?" Sakura parroted. She had just made her way down from the tree, albeit on wobbly legs.

"Yes, the water walking technique. I'll give you three guesses as to what it is."

"No need to be a smartass sensei."

* * *

Five minutes was all Team Seven really needed to find a suitable body of water. A river found a little inland to the island's forest was just wide and deep enough to suit Kakashi's needs. The river, while pristine and clear, was also running with just enough speed to give a challenge to those learning to walk on it.

"Well, get to it." Kakashi said as he turned with a huff. With his hand he gestured out to the water. Both students seemed confused.

"Is that it?" Sakura asked. Kakashi tilted his head.

"Yes. That's it. Start walking."

"No instructions? No guidelines?" Naruto asked. "You're just going to send us out on the water like that?"

"Why yes. That's exactly what I'm going to do."

"But that's not what a teacher does! Is it the same principles as the tree walking exercise?" Sakura asked.

"Basically." Kakashi responded. "Get to it."

"You're a terrible teacher, sensei." Naruto commented.

"Mhm," was Kakashi's reply before he set off back the way they came. He was likely to go check on Sasuke.

Sakura turned to her remaining teammate. "So what now?"

"Beats me." Naruto shrugged. He looked back to the river. Kakashi had chosen a great place to train them. The turbulence would provide an excellent simulator, much better than what a lake or a pool would. With the added difficulty of moving water a Genin could get experience moving on troubled surfaces, something a real combat situation would provide.

That being said, as far as anyone knew, Naruto had about as much experience as Sakura.

"This is gonna suck." Naruto thought as he placed a foot on the water. Channeling absolutely no chakra whatsoever into it, Naruto took a deep breath as he plunged into the frigid waters.

"Fwagh!" Naruto spat as he resurfaced. The orange clad boy coughed as he brought up more water than he expected to swallow. Chest high in the stuff, Naruto was able to turn to Sakura while standing in the deepest part of the river.

"Come on in, Sakura! Its great!"

Sakura grimaced. She stuck a toe into the water to test it, before immediately pulling it back out.

"I highly doubt that." Sakura commented.

"So what?" Naruto asked. "You're gonna have to come in some time."

"Says who?" Sakura responded. "I don't have to do anything I don't want to."

"You don't," Naruto admitted. "But what if sensei comes back and sees you haven't even tried?"

"I'll say it was your fault," Sakura responded. "It always is, somehow."

"And how could I have _possibly_ stopped you from getting _in_ the water?"

"I don't know. You have your ways." Sakura answered. She had folded her arms.

"Do you really think I would prevent you from _this_ paradise?" Naruto asked. He waved his hands through the water, causing small ripples and even smaller splashes. "That just doesn't sound like me."

Sakura had to take a pause at that info. He was right. Accepting her fate, the girl made her way back over to the riverbank.

"Fine," the pinkette huffed, "but only one foot."

"Only one foot," Naruto repeated, a smile on his face. Not fully trusting the boy, but not finding much reason not to either, Sakura hesitantly put her foot out over the water. Slowly she set her foot down then, right before it hit the surface, she closed her eyes and put her hands in a seal.

" **What is that, brat?** " the Kyuubi asked, one eye open inside his seal.

"She's using that handseal to help better focus her chakra." Naruto responded.

After channeling a bit of chakra, Sakura felt she had a balance just right. Opening her eyes, the girl set to succeed with a somewhat confident expression in her eyes. Letting her foot fall the last bit of distance, Sakura placed her foot on the water. It wavered, sending small ripples out over the water, but otherwise held.

"Naruto, I did it! I did the water wa-" Sakura started, before screeching as she was buried up to her head in ice cold water.

Sakura hacked as she resurfaced. "What the hell Naruto!"

Naruto chuckled, "What?"

"Why did you pull me in the water?" Sakura screamed. "I had it!"

"Haha," Naruto laughed. "You would have fell in eventually. Failing now makes it less scary!"

"But I _had_ it!" Sakura yelled.

"Okay maybe I wanted to get you wet too." Sakura splashed him.

"I hate you, Naruto," Sakura stated, exasperated. She was annoyed, but not really mad. "Help me get out."

Naruto scratched his head. "Why? Just stand on the water."

"I _would_ be if you didn't pull me under, you idiot!" Sakura responded with a second splash of water.

"Hey!" Naruto yelled, before splashing her back. Sakura, of course, responded with another yell. This one was more playful this time, and before long the two children…

Are they both children?

… before long the two children were in a splash fight. This continued until they were both drenched to the bone, with both of their clothing hanging off of them. Looking at their state of being, the two couldn't help but laugh.

"Look what you did, Naruto!" Sakura managed through fits of laughter. Naruto found the same difficulty talking.

"You started it!" He responded. The blonde used his hand to wipe some water out of his eyes.

"I guess," Sakura retorted, giggles escaping from her unbidden. Looking around, Sakura got a feel for the water before a look came on her face. Putting her hands together, the girl focused her chakra a bit before releasing the seal. Placing her hands on the water, Sakura slowly – and shakily – pushed herself out of the water. Once she was suitably out, she channeled chakra to her feet as well, and uneasily stood on top of the water.

Wobbling, but not to the point of instability, Sakura threw her hands in the air in a show of victory.

"I did it! I actually did it this time!" Naruto clapped for her.

"Good job Sakura!" Naruto yelled, still chest deep in water. When a wave shifted some of the substance into his mouth the boy grimaced, before jumping and landing feet first on the surface of the waves.

Sakura was shocked. "You can do the technique?"

"Of course," Naruto responded.

"But you can barely do the tree climbing technique!"

"They're two different techniques!" Naruto responded.

"No they're not!"

"To me they are!"

"That makes no sense!" Sakura screamed.

"It does to me."

Sakura gripped her hair in frustration.

"You're insufferable, Naruto." Sakura managed. This was immediately followed by the girl stumbling. Waving her arms, Sakura managed to regain her balance on the water, though her feet sank slightly under the surface.

"You okay, Sakura-chan?" Naruto asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine Naruto," the pinkette answered. With a stern glare at her feet Sakura scowled. "My chakra capacity is still not that good though. I'm near my limit for being here."

Naruto took a glance at her feet. The soles of her sandals fluctuated from being just under to just on top of the water, and the girl's legs were visibly shaking under the effort of keeping the technique alive. The boy Hokage rubbed his chin, and his experience of being a veteran shinobi kicked in.

"I think its high time I got out." Sakura stated. On wobbly steps the girl made her way over to the edge of the pond, only for her to be stopped by an orange clad arm.

"Where do you think you're going?" Naruto asked.

"Er, I'm… getting out?" Sakura answered, unsure of what the boy was getting at. Stepping to the side, Sakura tried to walk around the boy, only to be blocked again.

"Oh. Sorry then. Go ahead," Naruto responded. Sakura nodded, before stepping the other way, only to be blocked again.

"Okay, what's the big deal?"

"What are you talking about?" Naruto asked, bewildered. This being the case, the blonde still blocked Sakura on every attempt she made to cross the river, sometimes even stopping her when she tried to exit on the other side.

"Naruto, quit it! I'm running out of chakra! I'm going to fall into the river at this rate!" True enough, her legs were starting to droop, and she shook from obvious exhaustion. Still, Naruto would not relent.

"Sakura, how do you train a muscle?" Naruto asked. Sakura stared at him, and even though she was tired, she answered the best she could.

"You use it. Sometimes to its very limits so that the muscle can expand, adapt, and expand again."

"Very good," Naruto complimented. "Don't you think chakra is a lot like a muscle then?"

Sakura, eyes wide, gaped at her teammate. "What? No! Chakra is born from physical energies and-"

"And nothing Sakura. You may be the biggest scholar here, but I'm much better in practical use. Even you have to admit that."

Sakura's silence was her admittance.

"Good," Naruto continued. "So trust me. I know from a very good source..."

" **Her future self** ," Kyuubi interjected.

"… That training with your chakra enhances your coils. If you constantly use it, you'll have a capacity for more. Even if you don't have the outright quantity, when you rest you'll replenish to a higher cap. How do you think I got this much?" Naruto ended his speech with a hook. Even if it weren't truthful, for his massive chakra capacity was genetic, Sakura didn't know that, and would most likely use it as a reference to train to get it the honest way.

Sakura stared at Naruto, a pensive look on her face. After a small moment she stood a little straighter, albeit on still wobbly legs.

"I guess I can go a little longer." Sakura stated.

It was in this pace that the two stood on top of the water, gently going through exercises that required moving, such as walking, jumping, and towards the end dancing. Though Naruto had to practically hold the girl through the motions, it was still a fun time as much as the two were concerned.

By the end Sakura was utterly spent, and Naruto finally saw fit to let her leave the river. Placing her unconscious body against a tree not too far from the river, Naruto sat at the base of another and prepared to go into meditation. Before he could really get a feel however, a sound from the bushes interrupted his concentration.

"That can't be," Naruto asked. Kyuubi could feel the boy's heartbeat accelerate, and thus let his attention spread outward.

Coming out a bush not too far from the other side of the river, a girl not too taller than Naruto emerged. With perfect, almost doll-like skin, the girl had her hair done up in a bun with the rest of it flowing down over both sides of her face. She wore a blue kimono like outfit, and sandals to compliment the look. In her hand she held a basket with several blue flowers overflowing from it, it being carried by nails painted black.

Naruto almost forgot to breathe. Kyuubi reminded him.

" **Idiot. I thought we were over the whole, 'you need to breathe to live' thing.** "

The Kyuubi, for the first time in a long time, was ignored. Springing to his feet, Naruto exploded across the clearing, river and all, and instantly appeared in front of the girl. She flinched, not used to such speed, and almost fell on her ass as a result.

" **Whoa brat! What's gotten into you?** " the Kyuubi asked once more. Like before however, he was ignored. Naruto, not realizing the Hokage level of speed he just demonstrated, just stared at the person before him as if she were a ghost. Reaching forward, the boy attempted to touch her, as if to confirm she were real, then immediately brought his hand back, as if the very idea of interaction might break the person apart into many little pieces.

"H-Haku?" Naruto asked, and instantly Kyuubi knew.

" **He's… he's the one we killed. Isn't he?** "

Haku was just as alarmed at the whole situation, though for different reasons. Never before had he met someone so fast, bordering on faster than even him. Not even his Master had such speed, and for this reason he was suitably startled at the whole interaction.

"How do you know my name?" Haku asked, covering up his confusion for one situation with confusion for another. The boy in front of him tilted his head, before smacking himself as if he had messed up terribly. Pushing a hand forward, the blonde made to shake hands. Haku did not reciprocate.

"I don't make a habit of shaking hands with strangers I just meet." Haku responded. Naruto pulled his hand back, but the response did nothing to dull the megawatt smile on his face. Haku wondered how it was possible to have such a bright smile, hair and outfit and still be a ninja.

Sure enough Naruto was still the stealthiest in his Village, even after years of being Hokage. He still couldn't hide from his paperwork though.

"That's fine. I'm Naruto. Naruto Uzumaki: future Hokage!" Naruto yelled, adjusting his headband. Haku stared at him, before making his way around the boy to the river. Bending down and scooping up a handful, Haku turned back to the boy.

"I'm Haku, but you already knew that apparently," was all he said before taking a sip. When done, he wiped his mouth before addressing the boy again. "You still haven't told me exactly _how_ you know that, by the way."

Naruto scratched the back of his head. "I heard it through the village?"

"I don't visit the village."

"I heard it from the ninja."

"There are no ninja here. None of which would know of me regardless."

"Did I say ninja? I meant the mercenaries," Naruto added. Feeling annoyed.

"When did you have time to speak to them? You arrived here yesterday." Naruto quirked his eyebrow.

"And how would you know we arrived here yesterday?" the blond asked. He was met with an averted gaze.

"So you heard from the villagers?" Haku asked, standing again.

"I thought you didn't go to the village?" Naruto asked.

"The mercenaries do," Haku added.

"I didn't know the mercenaries visited the village."

"They don't, but the ninja do." Haku answered.

"I thought there were no ninjas?" Naruto tilting his head. Haku bore a vein on his head.

"There are two, one of which you're pissing off."

"I knew you were a ninja, Haku-kun."

And it was here Haku had to stop to analyze exactly where the conversation had gone. Realizing what he said, the boy quickly retreated from the blonde, his senbon at the ready.

"Who are you?" Haku asked. This question was met with wide eyes and an even wider grin, before a miasma of fire and… was that malevolence? Fire and pure malevolence erupted from thin air beside Naruto.

Emerging from the apparently evil smoke came a clone of the boy, but in an orange two piece suit. His hair was kept slicked back, and two fox ears adorned the top of his head instead of the two human ears that were at the original's side. With a nonchalant attitude, the newcomer immediately made his way over to the unconscious girl near the other side of the river and sat next to her, lounging immediately.

" **You have two minutes brat**."

* * *

Haku didn't know what to make of the situation. Two minutes? What did that mean? And why, for some reason, did every instinct in his body demand he ignore the fox before him?

It didn't make sense. In fact, none of this did. Nothing made sense since he made the decision to interact with this boy.

Initially this seemed a simple enough task. Upon picking around the island's forests in search of some flowers whose nectar made a suitable anesthetic, Haku stumbled upon the two "baby ninja" as his master called them, playing in the water not too far from where he searched. After spying on them for a bit, Haku could see they were in fact trying to learn the Water Walking Ability, something every Kiri inhabitant learned almost as soon as they could walk. Feeling no threat from at all from those who couldn't even master a children's technique, Haku made the decision to talk to them to at least glean information about their master.

Or were they called teachers in other relationships?

It didn't matter. Push comes shove, Haku would be able to easily deal with them should the time comes he needed to. That being the case, Haku was still paranoid. Living the life of a missing ninja for so long, he was privy to only taking the best chances. That included recon. So he waited. He waited until they were tired and nearly exhausted to make his move. When they were resting, one unconscious, Haku made his way to leave the bush, rather noisily at that, into the clearing.

So it was to his surprise the not one second after the very first leave crackled that he could feel one's attention on him.

As he fully emerged, Haku daintily brushed his hair away from his face and looked up to the boy in a meditative pose on the other side of the river. Plastering a fake smile, Haku prepared to greet the boy from the safety of both a river and several yards of land on both sides of said river.

Only for the boy to be directly in front of him, as if he were there the entire time.

Haku stumbled away, almost falling upon realization. Eyes darting over each feature of the boy, Haku wasn't sure what to think of this. He wasn't physically strong enough to pull off that speed. His lanky form underneath that hideous orange jumpsuit proved that. So how? Chakra? Did he have that much?

Back to the matter at hand, Haku was forced into a conversation with the boy. Initially he had attempted to play it cool. The effeminate boy made his way over to the river to attempt to drink from it like he planned. The boy immediately shattered this attempt, derailing an offhand inquiry meant to make him squirm and turning the conversation into an annoying banter. In an attempt to alleviate the boy's rambling, Haku said the first thing that came to mind.

Now the boy knew he was ninja.

Haku clutched the senbon in his hand, before releasing it to the point where he held it loosely. Not loose enough to drop it, but not tight enough that it would hinder his throw should things get nasty. This boy had already proven that he was capable enough to move at speeds even Haku couldn't track. Was this boy really Shinobi after all?

Haku stared down his adversary, wariness in his soft, gentle eyes. "Who are you?"

And then it happened. Fire, as hot and mythic as the fires of another realm, erupted from the air beside the boy introduced as Naruto. It twisted and contorted, controlled by some demon Haku couldn't begin to imagine. After a few seconds the fire flowed into a form, its body contours similar to that of Naruto's, before the fire breathed life into itself. Its shape became more pronounced, and out of the flames stepped a more dapper version of the blonde.

It paid Haku no heed as it stepped over to the girl on the other side of the river. Well, "stepped" is a general term, as the creature more or less floated over – moving on ethereal grace alone. Haku resisted the urge to grip his head. Something about this situation was telling him this wasn't right. This whole situation wasn't right, and he should just ignore the creature altogether.

The feeling was so strong that Haku was almost tempted to believe it, but something else stopped him. Something emanating from this very boy in front of him was making the urges that seemed almost as real as instinct seem like nothing more than whispers.

"Me? I already told you who I am." Naruto answered. His smile only stretched further on his face.

The feeling from the boy only increased as he spoke, and already Haku could feel the urge lessen. Barely, just barely, could Haku spare a glance over at the fox boy as he picked his teeth. His eyes immediately reverted back to the blonde.

"I care not for your name. I care for something holding more essence than that." Haku retorted. These were not the words that were the most pressing in his mind, but they were the ones that he felt he was supposed to ask. Why was he asking this?

Apparently the boy in front of him was just as confused as he was, for he tilted his head upon hearing the question. "What do you mean?"

"What I mean to say is: what do you fight for? Obviously you are Shinobi, your speed reveals that much of you. My only question is, why do you fight?" Haku flinched upon finishing his question. He wanted to bite his tongue with how much he was frustrated. Yes, these were questions that he was concerned with, but not ones he wanted to ask. The words, they came out of his mouth as though stock phrases, and Haku could do nothing to stop them.

Why was this happening?

"What kind of a question is that?" the boy asked. The response annoyed Haku, but not as much as it should have. Every word out of the boy's mouth felt like a salve on an itch he couldn't quite pinpoint enough to scratch. Haku continued talking, slightly easier now. The words were getting more natural the more he talked.

"Just answer," was all the fake Hunter Ninja was able to get out. Those words were _not_ what he was urged to say, and he felt somewhat of divine retribution hammering at his brain for disobeying, but these were words that he felt he needed to ask.

"Well, isn't it obvious?" the boy asked while embarrassingly scratching his head. "I fight for the only thing _worth_ fighting for. I fight to protect what is most precious to me, because when you fight to protect something, you bring out your true power."

Haku nodded at the blonde's answer. Despite his idiotic nature and apparent strength and ability to summon demons apparently, underneath his cold exterior existed a man with motives similar to Haku's own. This being the case however, almost everyone fought to protect something. Whether it be money or fame or power, everyone fought to protect some kind of selfish agenda. This boy would be no different. As inconspicuous as possible, Haku attempted to shift his arm into a position to strike. A properly thrown senbon should be just enough surprise for Haku to slip into an ice mirror and get away before the boy could recover. He would be giving in to the urges in his head to get as far away as possible from the boy, but for once in the strange afternoon he agreed with them.

Just as Haku was about to strike however, the boy's smile disarmed him. Not taking any note of danger whatsoever, Naruto continued.

"I fight to protect my precious people, Haku. Because what use is anything else in the world if you have no one to share it with? All the money, power, fame… they mean nothing if you are all by yourself."

And then, something in Haku snapped. The urges, slowly being reduced to whispers before, were now completely gone. The boy's words, resonating so deeply with Haku's own soul managed to, if just for a moment, free Haku in a way he never thought before. Bound no more, Haku could only stare at the boy before him, his ever radiant smile never faltering.

"I-I have to go." Haku stammered. Regaining use of his feet, Haku completely forgot about his ability to use ice to teleport as he ran to the treeline. Too many thoughts and emotions were running through his head at the thought of meeting another so much like himself that he could barely keep his mind straight.

Turning, Haku thought it prudent to at least give the boy a taste of his own medicine. Deciding on the words, Haku turned to address the boy before jumping off. He would flabbergast the blonde as well.

"By the way, I'm a boy." Haku proudly stated. To his unending disbelief, the boy ninja just laughed.

"I know, Haku." He responded. "And I am the Seventh Hokage from the future."

Haku's eyes glazed over.

* * *

" **Thirty seconds, brat** ," called Kurama as he stood from his place near Sakura. Despite the time he spent lounging on the grass, not a single blade of grass nor clump of dirt marred his suit. Naruto wondered how he did it.

"I realized, furball. I think that conversation went well."

" **It did** ," Kyuubi stated, hopping over the river in a single bound. " **Until you mentioned that you were Hokage. Time is going to reset now.** "

At this Naruto scratched his head. Looking around, the world was still in vibrant color. The river still even flowed, and if you listened hard enough, you could hear Sakura's soft breathing over the humming brook.

"Are… are you sure Kyuubi?" Naruto asked. "It usually resets by now."

Kyuubi also looked around. " **Wow. For once you're right. Why hasn't it reset?** "

"Maybe because I answered jokingly that Haku didn't take me seriously?" Naruto supplemented. He looked over to where Sakura was asleep. He had to admit that he liked her hair better when it was short. Having spent the most time around it that way, it was hard not to prefer the normal over the alternative, with short hair definitely becoming the normal.

" **Perhaps.** " Kyuubi answered, a pensive look on his face. " **There's more to this, I know there is, but for now we have no time to talk about it. Estimation of about ten seconds before your teacher returns. I will talk to you later, brat**." Kyuubi finished, before disappearing in a wreath of flames. As soon as the last ember died out on the wind did Kakashi flash into the clearing, Sasuke in tow. Upon looking around, Kakashi saw Naruto on the other side of the river slightly damp from the exercise, with Sakura asleep on the side he arrived in.

"I see you're done," Kakashi drawled, dropping Sasuke like a sack of potatoes.

Naruto nodded, a vibrant smile on his face.

"Yeah sensei. We're all done here."

* * *

A full week found Naruto and the rest of his team making their way to the bridge Tazuna had hired them to help guard. Hands behind his head, Naruto was rather pleased with what they had managed to learn.

Sakura stretched her arms above her head. They had woken up early that morning to match with the carpenters' work schedule, and as such hadn't fully acclimated to the rising sun.

"I feel better than I thought I would waking up this early," Sakura commented. She finished the statement with a yawn, but a good one at that, as she smiled shortly after.

"Access to a larger pool of chakra would do that for you," Kakashi stated, his head in a book. Turning a page, he spared a glance at his sole female student. "Its nowhere near Jonin, or even Chunin level, but its effectively twice what it was before. With the physical and chakra intensive training we had you go through, the chakra boost should make you feel a lot better than you did before." Kakashi then looked away. "I should estimate you feel nowhere near as sluggish as before."

Sure enough, Sakura was feeling springy and alive. Jumping every other step, Sakura could feel a spring in her gait that wasn't there before.

"Yeah, I guess you're right," Sakura stated. She flexed her fingers as she walked along. "I think I can get used to this."

Kakashi looked over to another member of their team. Naruto was walking slightly behind the rest of the team, but not for any less energy. No, the boy seemed to be almost vibrating in anticipation.

" **Brat, you're too excited**." Kyuubi growled. " **You're barely keeping yourself together**."

"Well, can you blame me?" Naruto asked. "We're going to be charging headfirst into my first ninja battle! But this time, I'm ready!"

Kakashi started wondering exactly how fast his blonde Genin could shake. He decided to ask a question regardless. "And how are you making out Naruto? How's the jutsu coming along?"

Over the course of the week Kakashi decided to teach Naruto an expansion on the jutsu he was using. The teacher was still apprehensive around his blonde charge, but he was still dedicated to teaching. Seeing as he had nothing to teach the boy anymore after the tree and water walking technique, he decided to work on something he knew.

"Its coming along great, Kakashi. I can't wait to use it on Zabuza." And Naruto actually couldn't. With perfect manipulation of Kyuubi's – and subsequently all of the other bijuu's – chakra, he didn't really have a need to learn any other elemental manipulation. When the time came for him to try to grasp the basics and learn more versatile techniques than the Rasengan, no one in the village felt themselves appropriate enough to teach him. Just because he had multiple kekkai genkai under his command didn't mean he knew exactly how he commanded them.

So to receive any instruction, however basic, in a jutsu other than Rasengan was a goldmine to him, and he spent the time he had Kakashi to himself carefully and efficiently. The week ended with him using the last day to experiment on his own.

That day turned out to be the most dangerous of them all. A day spent allowing Naruto anything was a day best spent not happening.

With a mean grin on his face Naruto flexed his hand. He was extremely excited to see Zabuza.

Kakashi was not as excited. "You will be using no such technique on him. That jutsu was not meant for direct contact with the enemy, and being in water for any reason near Zabuza is not condoned. Understand?"

Naruto nodded his head, but Kakashi could feel he wasn't really listening. Nodding his head, Kakashi turned to the last member of his team. Sasuke followed along after his teammates with no real instruction from anyone, but he still shuffled as if he were nothing more than a zombie. Face dull and eyes blank and lifeless, he had still made progress this week, and thus Kakashi considered team training a success.

Nothing could put down Kakashi's mood right now.

At least, that's what he thought. As soon as he came into view of the bridge he could see it was covered in fog.

Kakashi immediately cursed.

"Okay. Let's go with a new plan. Team, on me." Kakashi instructed, no joking in his voice whatsoever. His team, including Sasuke, collapsed on the man. "We are going to go in the fog of war. Stay near me, stay behind me, and most importantly do not break formation until I say so. Understand?" Kakashi did not wait for an answer, for he bridged no room for dissent, and instead immediately pushed forward. The team felt ready, until a person coughed from behind them.

"Uhm, Mr. Ninja? What do I do?" Tazuna, their mission directive, asked. Kakashi groaned.

"Oh right. Just uh. Stay behind us or something." And with that the team advanced.

* * *

Zabuza was at a loss. Even massacre of the entirety of the people working on the bridge hadn't succeeded in improving his mood. Turning he watched as Haku, his all important tool, stood with a blank expression on his face as blood splattered everywhere across his frame. His normally perfectly white Hunter's Nin mask was splattered with blood from the Demon's rampage, and yet the boy still did not move.

Zabuza knew for a fact that Haku hated blood and causing other people to secrete it. This was truly troublesome.

This being the case, Zabuza couldn't exactly _stop_. This was his mission, and errant weapon or not he was going to complete it. With a halfhearted swing of his sword, another of the bridge builder's heads would roll, and with it the missing nin would be one step closer to achieving his pay. This time however, his swing was met with resistance. The _clang_ sound of metal against metal could be heard ringing throughout the cloud covered bridge.

Zabuza turned his head to see Kakashi standing before him. A kunai stood between the edge of his cleaver and the scared man's throat.

"Good to see you again, Copy Ninja," Zabuza teased. Slowly, he removed the blade from almost eviscerating the man's neck before stepping over to the side of the bridge where Haku stood. The scared bridge builder ran for his life.

"Likewise, Zabuza-chan," Kakashi answered, slowly stepping over to where his team stood. Team Seven stood at attention, at least two of them ready to fight. Behind them stood Tazuna, the builder in charge of the bridge and the man Zabuza was mainly supposed to kill. Zabuza tilted his head in confusion.

"Why did you bring my target?" the Mist ninja asked. Kakashi, after a moment of consideration, quickly turned to look at the man.

"Why _did_ we bring him?" Kakashi asked, unsure of the reason himself. "We could have left him home. I doubt there were any ninja back at the house."

* * *

Meanwhile, back at the house, a very different scene was happening.

Dangling above a pot of acid, two men cried tears of outright fear as they were slowly lowered to their deaths.

" **Scream maggots. Scream**." Kyuubi chanted with endless mirth.

Inari, who was the grandson of Tazuna, along with his mother, could only stand there in abject horror and watch.

* * *

"I don't think you want Tazuna back at the house." Naruto commented. From their link he could hear the Kyuubi chanting what amounted to sadistic death threats.

"Whatever your reason, I don't care," Zabuza interjected. "Its high time I killed you all here and now. Haku?"

The boy, upon hearing his name, quickly donned the Hunter's Nin mask and darted forward. Ice senbon forming in his hand, the boy was an avatar of speed as he sprinted towards his foes.

Kakashi looked to his own team. "Okay. Sakura, I need you to protect Tazuna. Naruto, since Sasuke is out of commission I need you to-" was all the Jonin was able to say before a streak of black darted past him. Whipping his head around, Kakashi could see that the previous dead weight was now out there going toe to toe with the effeminate boy.

"Okay," Kakashi stated, a bit unsure. "It seems he has this under control. Naruto?"

Naruto turned to his teacher.

"Provide backup to the Uchiha." Kakashi then removed the part of his headband which concealed his Sharingan eye. Upon opening it, the fabled Copy Wheel Eye spun to life as Kakashi stared down the A-Ranked criminal across from him.

"Zabuza is mine."

Said criminal smiled. "Wouldn't have it any other way." And with that declaration the two sped off to engage in a dance of stab related death. Sparks clashing from their impact, Kakashi led the fight further down the bridge and away from his team. Naruto turned to Sakura.

"So uh, protect Tazuna?" he asked. Sakura nodded dumbly.

"I guess?" she replied. Her eyes were still on Sasuke as he fought with a vigor and speed he hadn't possessed before. Haku too fought with seemingly no recognition of the blonde and their previous conversation, and if asked, the two seemed to be going through the motions.

"It seems you have gained some speed," Haku mumbled, no tone or essence in his voice.

"Speed isn't all I have gotten," Sasuke answered just as robotically.

Naruto tilted his head. What was going on? The smell of burning flesh came to mind and instantly Naruto thought of the Kyuubi.

"Welcome back furball," Naruto thought. Kyuubi grunted in satisfaction.

" **There's nothing like lowlife scum to get you through the midnight munchies** ," Kyuubi responded.

"But its not midnight?" Naruto asked. Naruto could somehow _feel_ the Kyuubi's malicious grin.

" **Oh, don't worry brat. It will be by the time they** _ **really**_ **start digesting. What's going on here?** "

"That's a good question," Naruto responded as he walked over to the fight currently raging on between the two boys. Sasuke currently had a kunai out and was using it to clash with Haku's senbon. "I really don't know the answer to it."

" **You don't know the answer to most questions** ," Kyuubi huffed. " **Why I even bother to ask sometimes startles me. Well, I won't be able to settle down until I know so… You know the drill**."

Naruto grimaced. "Do I have to?"

Kyuubi nodded. " **Such is the curse of the stupid. Until you are smart enough to answer questions both philosophical and pedantic you will be forced to run headlong into danger for both my amusement and science** ," Kyuubi then yawned. " **Go on. On with you**."

Naruto rolled his eyes. Despite the Kyuubi's urging that he was _not_ obliged to follow, he was still more or less going to run headlong into this fight. True, it wasn't where he came in last time, but it was pretty close to it. Maybe.

Clutching a kunai, the blonde boy ran straight into the clash between two boys. In the back of his mind, the ex-Hokage noted how similar it was to Kakashi and Zabuza's. As soon as he got close enough, Naruto jumped clear over Sasuke and landed behind Haku. With a spin, the boy attempted to slash the ice user's back.

Only to be blown clear across the bridge and land outside of it.

"What." Naruto stated more than asked.

" **I see.** " Kyuubi pondered.

"What? What do you see?" Naruto asked. "We share the same vision. How the hell did you see more of that than I did?"

Kyuubi made a "tsk" sound, " **Foolish boy, you** _ **look**_ **but do not** _ **see**_ **. You try, but do not understand. Once you open your mind to the endless possibilities of the higher beings…**

"'Higher beings' being you?"

" **You will experience true nirvana.** "

Naruto rubbed his eyes. "You don't actually know what happened, do you?"

" **Not really, no**." Kyuubi admitted. " **I'm just guessing here, but it could be the gods interfering and making sure you don't enter until you're supposed to.** " The Kyuubi then pondered a moment. " **That could also be the reason why they're moving like they are now. This was what they were supposed to be doing, so they're being forced to do it.** "

Naruto walked back to the bridge and lifted his hand when he got to the edge. Sure enough, his hand touched on some sort of invisible barrier.

"They're getting really desperate with this now," Naruto commented.

" **Everybody gets desperate with you** ," Kyuubi responded. " **For instance, I got desperate trying to get you to take a shower. The result was me almost blowing up your village. Again**."

Naruto chuckled. "Your realize that's going to stop working after a while?"

" **Gods bless whatever village or social gathering you end up in when it does**."

"Honestly I'm surprised it worked the first time."

" **Honestly I'm surprised it took that much the first time**."

Their banter finished for now, Naruto looked around for something else to do. His hand immediately fell through the barrier.

"Oh, I can go in now." Naruto stated unenthusiastically.

" **Do you not want to?** "

"Well, its not that I _don't_ want to. Its just that I realized there are so many other things I could be doing right now. A lot of my life has been wasted on fighting just really stupid things and now that I think about it there's so much more to it than endless war and-"

" **You can use that new water jutsu on Haku's ice if you overload it enough** ," Kyuubi stated.

"Over it. Lets go furball."

* * *

Naruto flashed onto the bridge in a show of light and theatrics as everyone on the bridge, fighting or not, turned to him.

"Worry not boys, your savior is here!" Naruto shouted. No one seemed to pay him any mind.

"About time you got back," Kakashi grumbled before being led further down the bridge again.

"Naruto? Where were you?" Sakura asked, incredulous. "You've been letting Sasuke fight that Hunter Ninja all alone! You _know_ about his disability!"

Naruto chuckled. "Yeah, sorry Sakura-chan." Naruto then turned to notice the situation the two boys found themselves in.

"Oh. Its Haku's ice mirrors."

Realization then dawned on the boy.

"Oh shit, its Haku's ice mirrors!" And with that the blonde rushed into the fray.

"No, you idiot, don't come inside," Sasuke robotically warned. Naruto was already inside when this happened though. His reward was a senbon through the thigh. Of course, since pain tolerance was just as much mental as physical the blonde juggernaut simply soldiered through it and the ice more or less melted as the wound healed before he even really noticed. Naruto took this as a form of good tidings.

Haku took this as a reason to try harder.

Before either boy could react, they were both embedded with numerous ice senbon, neither of which could dodge them.

Naruto grimaced. "I forgot how fast Haku was in this thing," he commented, blocking a senbon from one direction only to be hit by another from an opposite one. "Unless I show off more chakra than I should, I can't really keep up." The ice senbon were melting and being healed as soon as they hit, but that only seemed to inspire the masked foe to go faster.

" **You could blow up the bridge and everything on it**."

"Too much work. And I think the gods really want me to stick to script for now. Next suggestion."

" **New water technique?** "

"Good work team," Naruto cheered mentally as he flipped through handsigns and ran towards one of the mirrors. You see, they were currently surrounded by a dome of them. Haku attempted to stop the blond by throwing senbon at him.

Pitiful idea really. At some point the needles became a game to the boy.

"You think he'll ever hit a vital by accident?" Naruto mentally asked.

" **I worry about you sometimes** ," Kyuubi responded.

When that idea horribly failed, Haku switched to a new one. Namely kicking. He kicked Naruto back to the middle and quickly disappeared back into the ice mirrors.

Naruto coughed from his place on the ground. "Did he just kick me?"

" **It would appear he did**."

"That bastard!" Naruto immediately ran back to the mirrors again. His new jutsu was one which needed direct physical contact to apply, and as such Naruto held out his hand in an attempt to touch at least one of the ice mirrors. Haku wouldn't allow it. Naruto was kicked back again. This time however Haku learned his lesson and his efforts redoubled as ice senbon literally showered from the air around the two.

Sasuke, Sharingan now active in its lowest state, frantically deflected projectile after projectile. Naruto took a less graceful approach to surviving the onslaught.

" **You could at least try** ," Kyuubi drawled.

"Its starting to feel good."

After a while both boys were veritable pincushions with neither showing any obvious distress over the situation, though for very different reasons. Haku, after taking a quick breather from the onslaught, prepared for his final attack. Ice needles at the ready, Haku attacked the easier of the two targets first, and let his attack flow towards the blonde who seemed so eager to be hit. Naruto saw the attack coming, of course, but made no move to dodge it.

This was, unfortunately, exactly what happened last time this situation happened and thus the same thing that happened last time did as well.

That sentence made sense.

Naruto's eyes widen as Sasuke's blood splattered over his face.

"W-why?" the blonde asked. Sasuke smirked… robotically. Somehow.

"I don't know, idiot." And the boy collapsed. Naruto looked down at the seemingly dead Uchiha in shock.

Before a wicked smile came over his face.

" **Is it time, brat?** "

"Oh its time."

And with that a miasma of dark and heavy chakra spilled over the bridge. Radiating outwards, all those present on the bridge could get a taste of what was currently going on in the mirrors.

Though only those inside of Haku's kekkai genkai could actually feel it.

Come later times you would be surprised at how much that mattered.

XxX

The first thought that came to Haku's mind was that he could feel. The second thought that came to his mind was acknowledgment of the threat before him. Twice he had felt that power in his life now, and after the first he resolved to never feel it again. This being the case, the last time he was in a combat situation he was forced into it against his will, and as such assumed the same of this case as well.

"Life just keeps finding use for me, doesn't it?" Haku mumbled, before pulling back a senbon and tossing it with all of his might. It sailed right over the chakra demon's shroud, for Haku knew it would have no effect, and instead head straight for the one other target in range. The needle covered Sasuke had his back turned to the real ice user, and as such should have been in no position to evade.

The thing about ninjas is that they never act according to how they're supposed to.

Turning on a dime, blood leaked out of Sasuke's eyes as a two tomoe Sharingan turned into a three, then mutated even more. Pinwheel like eyes stared down the senbon, then the ice user, before terrible black flames burned through them both.

XxX

Upon recognizing the familiar feeling, having been on the receiving end far more times than was comfortable, a chakra shrouded Naruto turned to his teammate in shock.

"S-Sasuke?" the boy asked.

Sasuke, upon hearing his name, turned the source of the voice. Upon both realizing the familiarity in the name and noticing he was clutching his eyes with his _left_ hand, Sasuke's genius brain came to two very quick and accurate assumptions.

He was in the past.

Somehow, this was all Naruto's fault.

"NARUTO!"


	9. Chapter 9: Wave Mission: End

_**Crack Fics can be serious from time to time, right?**_

 _ **I swear this is what happens whenever I start to take things seriously.**_

 _ **That being said, I have some VERY special things to say. Mostly regarding comments. First off, I would like to address the fact that some people were disappointed that Sasuke was no longer a walking asparagus. I have to admit that it was funny writing him off like that. However, I always planned to have him come back, and that's saying something as I hadn't even intended to plan for this story. Him turning to a vegetable for the express purpose of coming back was always planned, and in fact will be explained next chapter.**_

 _ **(It was also getting annoying to write a walking brick)**_

 _ **That out of the way, on to the individual comments:**_

 _ **Gohan90: You are... brilliant actually. Your suggestion to have Naruto pretend to be "normal past-Naruto" was so hilarious to me while thinking it up that I almost considered it. Unfortunately you suggested this after I actually came up with a plot for this story. It would conflict with what I have planned, and thus, I couldn't fit it in. (Doesn't mean I didn't include a cameo of the idea.) As to why Sasuke is in the past now... That's a plot point, and as stated above, that's explained later.**_

 _ **Sagar Hussein, Diaspared and ArturoLJ50. Thank you for the constant comments and encouragement. There were others, like Huarta, who comment often to let me know how I'm doing, but you guys showed up frequently over the longest period of time.**_

 _ **The rest of you, thank you for letting me know how I'm doing. Even those who expressed dislike of my story (mostly on how it was too mean) was useful. I need you guys a lot, and I'm entirely grateful for what you guys are doing, namely taking the time to tell me what you thought of the chapters. Even short things are more than enough to keep me going.**_

 _ **SquidinaLighthouse I'm looking at you. That comment was touching. And Huarta? Thank you. I didn't even realize I had a writing style yet.**_

 _ **Finally, the last point in this hopelessly long rant... Thank you. I know I didn't touch on every comment made. Some of them made me feel impossibly good to the point I didn't think I deserved it. I've read them ALL and I will continue to. You don't know how much I love and value your input. For those of you I missed mentioning, I am so sorry. I really can't mention too much without padding this chapter way too much, but I love you all. Thank you**_

 _ **But you're not here for all this are you? On to the chapter. Exit: Wave. Next chapter is "Enter: Plot"**_

* * *

Sasuke, as he was wont to do, did what he did naturally when faced with a new situation of which he had no prior knowledge. He attacked Naruto. This attack was melded with a vengeance of pure malice.

Naruto watched as Sasuke's Susanoo ability formed around his right arm. The purple chakra construct melded and grew until it was as big as Sasuke's body. Cocking the augmented arm back, Sasuke used chakra to propel himself like a rocket across the gap between him and the blonde. Naruto stared, before his consciousness was pulled into himself. Naruto landed with a splash inside the seal.

"Alright. What gives, furball?" Naruto asked. He turned to see the Kyuubi looking down on him. In fox form at full power Kurama looked like a truly fascinating and powerful entity. Naruto still neglected to show respect.

Kurama yawned, entirely used to this treatment. " **You're going to take the hit, brat**."

Naruto, upon hearing, swiftly looked back to the screen of water that hung in the air in front of both himself and Kyuubi. The screen showed what Naruto was seeing in the real world, only in a speed so slow it was almost still. Naruto, now under a speed where he could properly see it, could make out every individual bone in the chakra shroud of Sasuke's Susanoo, as well as every wrinkle on his best friend's childlike face. The man-boy was upset – pissed even – and was out for blood.

Naruto slowly turned back to the Kyuubi. "You uh… You sure about that?" Naruto asked.

" **Definitely sure**." Kyuubi responded.

"And what makes you so sure about that?" Naruto asked. "Last I checked I really didn't want to get beaten to a pulp. What reason could you _possibly_ have in that deranged little mind of yours that could make me take that hit?"

Kyuubi yawned again, this time harder, before using one of his long, fox-like nails to clean his ear. " **Because it'd be funny**."

Naruto stared. "Wonderful reasoning."

" **Thank you. I tried**." Kyuubi drawled.

"I'm not doing it."

" **Yes you are.** "

"I'm not your jester, Kyuubi." Naruto responded, standing up. Looking around, he could make out what the seal looked like. It was still a sewer as far as everything went, with a thin layer of water coating the floor and pipes running over the walls going to and from the chakra beast's cage. This visage continued until the gates of Kyuubi's cage, where the environment exploded into a giant plain complete with fresh green grass, a hill and a giant tree posted on top of it. In the middle of this expanse lounged the Kyuubi, his head resting on his haunches and eyes half closed.

From here the Kyuubi, rather sleepily, addressed his host. " **First off, you are definitely my jester. You exist for many reasons – many of which include my amusement.** "

Naruto scoffed, rolling his eyes.

" **Second off, imagine the hilarity that would ensue should you take the hit.** "

"I don't find my face being busted in that funny," Naruto commented, rubbing his jaw. He was punched by that chakra monstrosity before. It wasn't very fun.

" **Oh relax. You have my chakra** **shroud** **. At the worst it'll be a love tap**."

"At some point that stops being a 'love tap' and starts being an entire truck, fox."

" **Oh stop being a pansy** ," said fox chided. " **Go out there and take that hit like a man**."

Naruto shook his head. "I already said no. I'm not getting punched in the face for the sole sake of your enjoyment."

" **That's the thing, pansy. You won't be doing this for me. You'll be doing this for** _ **both**_ **of us**."

Naruto, knowing the Kyuubi usually didn't say things _just_ to pull a trick on him, stopped in the middle of his rant. With a raised eyebrow he turned to the fox. "Explain."

Seeing he had his host's attention, Kyuubi smiled. Raising from his rested position, he leaned closer to the blond, baring every twisted fang.

" **Listen boy** ," the beast started. " **If you take the hit and pretend to be hurt, the Uchiha will think that its your past self. He already knows he's in the past. Wouldn't it be funnier if you convince him he's the only one here? At the very least it'll allow you to avoid him throwing Ameterasu at you with every oppurtunity.** "

Naruto, who was following along, looked up in confusion. "Ameter-what?" Kyuubi sighed.

" **The crazy black fire**."

"Oh right!" Naruto screamed in recognition. He pounded a fist into his palm. "But yeah, that would be awesome. That and everything else you said. It would be funny to see him floundering around a bit."

" **Aren't I the greatest?** " Kyuubi asked, his smirk growing wider. " **The only problem is that there is a very real chance this ruse won't go on for too long**." Naruto shrugged.

"That's fine," Naruto stated. "Messing with him for however long it may be that this lasts will be worth it."

" **Then I'm glad we have an understanding**." Kyuubi drawled, once again laying his head down. With a yawn he motioned his two fingers in a 'shooing' motion, and Naruto could feel himself being ejected from the space.

" **I'll buff the shroud until just before impact. Do your best to not die.** "

"Wait wha-" was all Naruto could get out before he was back in his real body. Looking up, the boy had all of a split second to react before a giant, purple chakra enhanced fist hit his entire body. Flying through the air, Naruto smashed through an already melting ice mirror before skidding across the ground and landing in a crumpled heap before Sakura and Tazuna.

"Naruto?" Sakura asked, her voice quivering. "Are you okay?"

"I've been better," Naruto answered, his voice shaking as his mind rattled in his head. On the other side of the bridge a very much younger than before Sasuke emerged from the half melted mirrors. Dragging a half burned Haku with his left arm while holding said arm with his right one, Sasuke made his way over to the trio. Dropping the ice user, Sasuke leveled a glare at Naruto, whose chakra shroud had started to fade.

"Get up dobe. I know you're still alive," Sasuke grunted. His face was in a scowl as he glared down at his lifelong rival.

"Ugh. Of course I'm alive, teme!" Naruto yelled, rubbing his dislocated jaw as he pushed himself up off the ground. Looking at the boy back in the eyes, Naruto could see that his brother in all but blood still had the Sharingan active. "What's the deal?"

"You know what's wrong, idiot. Explain."

Naruto tilted his head. "Explain what? Why you're going around just punching people?" Sasuke's Mangekyo flared.

"No. What? No! Explain why I'm a-" was all he was able to get out. Sakura, who was initially stunned into inaction was now fully functional again. Lunging forward the pinkette firmly tackled the Uchiha to the ground.

"Sasuke! You're back!" she yelled. Tears fell from her eyes as she nuzzled her face into the boy's shirt.

"Wha-what? Wait, Sakura?" Sasuke asked, his eyes wide. "What are you talking about?"

"You were in a coma, Sasuke-kun! Kakashi-sensei and Naruto and I didn't know what to do about it!"

Sasuke looked up. Eyes focusing on Naruto, he asked Sakura a question. "Is… is that so?"

"Yeah! Do you… not remember anything?" Sakura asked, her eyes overflowing with tears. Swallowing, Sasuke looked as if he were a deer in headlights. Naruto repressed the urge to snicker. In their later years the sight of Sakura crying even a little bit was enough to break Sasuke into little pieces.

"N-no," Sasuke muttered out. "Everything is a bit hazy," Sasuke managed to say. Raising his left hand to her head, an action he still was not accustomed to, he awkwardly rustled her pink locks. This seemed to work a bit, as the girl's sobs lessened. Eventually Sakura's cries ended, and she settled into a light sleep.

"That's better. I don't like it when Sakura-chan cries," Naruto stated, relief painted on his face. "Don't get too comfy there, teme."

"You haven't called Sakura 'chan' in years, idiot."

"What are you talking about?" Naruto asked. "I call her that all the time!"

"You can stop now, idiot."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"You're a bad actor, Naruto. Stop it."

"Whatever, bastard. Just take care of Sakura-chan while I..." it was here Naruto noticed that Haku had already jumped in front of Kakashi's Chidori while they were talking. "Huh."

"Its weird seeing someone other than me use that move." Sasuke then turned to Naruto. "It must be weird seeing it used on someone other than you."

"Why would I want it to be used on me?" Naruto asked. He was still fixated on Haku's now dead body; something about the scene struck terrible chords inside him. Sasuke scoffed from behind the blonde's back.

"If I have to look into your mind for the truth, I will." Sasuke remarked. Gently he laid Sakura down on the bridge, cupping her hands under her head so she wouldn't be on a completely hard surface.

"Whatever are you talking about?"

"Alright. You asked for it." And just like that Naruto found his jaw being gripped. Rather rough, Naruto's face was forced around until Naruto was staring Sasuke in his pinwheel shaped Sharingan. Once again Naruto found himself falling into his own mind's sewer.

Stepping next to him Sasuke, in his adult form, looked around.

"Its the same as I remember," Sasuke remarked. Looking around, his Sharingan eyes did not seem impressed.

" **Last time you were here your eyesight was better, brat.** "

Sasuke was at first alarmed. Confusedly he turned to the giant fox in the room. "Why are you speaking like that? If I had to imagine your voice in text, it'd be in bold."

" **Nostalgia**."

"I see." Sasuke responded. He gestured around himself. "So I guess you're the reason the idiot is trying to act?"

"What do you mean, 'trying'? I was doing a pretty good job!" Naruto yelled. "And how are you an adult?" Naruto was ignored.

" **I** **am** **. I thought it'd be funny if you thought you were the only one.** "

"You're as insufferable as ever Kurama."

"Is no one going to answer me?" Naruto yelled. "This is my head after all."

"And what did you mean by, 'my eyesight was better?'"

" **Have you not seen yourself recently?** " Kyuubi asked. Sasuke shrugged.

"I just got back here. One minute I was roaming the lands on a mission for _this_ idiot," Sasuke pointed to Naruto, who was pouting on the floor from being ignored. "And next thing I know I sense some hostility behind me. Without thinking I set it on fire, but all of a sudden I could feel an appendage that wasn't there before."

"Not to mention the needles sticking out of your body," Naruto commented. Sasuke bopped him on the head.

"I'm small and weak again and I can't do anything about it. Now..." Sasuke turned to Naruto. "Send me back or I'll burn everything to the ground. I don't know _why_ exactly you brought me here, but you're sending me back."

Naruto grimaced. "I didn't bring you here, bastard."

Sasuke blinked. Once, twice, then three times he blinked while staring down his orange companion.

"Excuse me?"

"I said that I didn't bring you back here. Did you lose your hearing with your eyesight?" Naruto repeated, obviously annoyed. In all likelihood he was probably healed from the punch already, but the phantom pain still existed.

"If you didn't do this, then who did?" Sasuke inquired. His face was scrunched up in confusion. "And why do you two keep going on and on about my eyesight? I can see just fine!"

Both Naruto and Kyuubi looked at one another, before turning back to the boy.

"Do you really not realize?" Naruto asked. Taking this moment, he stood up from his place on the watery ground. Making his way over into Kyuubi's part of the seal, he stood there, letting the breeze blow over him and dry him off. Seeing as this was his mind and he could simply _will_ himself dry, Kyuubi just assumed he liked the experience.

"Do I not realize what, exactly?" Sasuke asked, his head tilting. Naruto and Kyuubi shared another glance, before Kyuubi raised a finger, his nail gesturing to the water in Naruto's part of the seal. A geyser erupted from the expanse, before solidifying and turning into a perfect mirror. Sasuke pointed to it.

"I assume you want me to look into that?"

"I knew you were the smart one on the team," Naruto chided. Sasuke threw a shuriken of pure black flame at him.

"Why is everyone so violent at me!" Naruto yelled, dodging to the side. The shuriken continued until it hit Kurama, at which point it immediately dispersed.

"Because its endlessly entertaining. With your luck, I doubt you can even die."

"Luck doesn't work like that, bastard," Naruto exclaimed. Sasuke simply brushed him off while walking towards the mirror. Upon approaching it the man studied his features.

"Black cloak, nice hair, chiseled chin..." Sasuke verbally listed, going over himself for his own vanity. "I don't see anything wrong. Even my Sharingan look perfect."

"Oh, both of them?" Naruto asked.

"Yeah, both of them. In fact, there's a symmetry there that I didn't notice until no-"

The genius then froze.

"WHERE THE HELL IS MY RINNEGAN," the man screamed. His face was absolutely mortified as he stared over both of his Mangekyo Sharingan with no concentric eye in sight. Broken, Sasuke turned to his lifelong rival. "Idiot. Where is my Rinnegan?"

Naruto shrugged. "When you come back in time, any features you had while an adult are erased while you're a child. Mental things like how to do jutsu and even chakra capacity remains, but physical properties disappear. Sorry bastard. You don't have your Rinnegan anymore."

Wordlessly, Sasuke turned back to the mirror.

"So… I _don't_ have my Rinnegan anymore?"

"I believe I just said that, yes."

"I… I see," Sasuke mumbled. Rising from where he had collapsed, the man turned back into a boy in Naruto's mindscape.

"Okay, how are you guys doing that?" Naruto asked. He was ignored.

"Well Naruto. There's only one thing to do in this situation. Are you ready to go back to the real world?" Naruto stared at the boy.

"Uh, its my brain. Shouldn't I be the one asking that question?"

"No, you should not be." And with that the two were back in the real world. Sasuke's grip on Naruto's chin shook and wavered, before falling away. Looking at it forlornly, Sasuke tightened his hand into a fist, squeezing as hard as he could, before glaring at Naruto.

"I don't know how, but this is your fault."

"How exactly is it my fault?" Naruto asked, flabbergasted.

"I don't know yet," Sasuke responded. "But you're going to pay for it." And with that Sasuke cocked his fist back. Once again purple chakra started to swell around it until a purple skeleton encased his arm.

"Oh. This isn't good."

" **Indeed** ," Kyuubi growled. " **It seems the kit has broken**."

"Are we… fighting back?" Naruto asked, more unsure than anything. "He doesn't have the Rinnegan. I think we can handle him."

"Just because I don't have my Rinnegan doesn't make me any weaker. If anything, _you're_ weaker because you don't have your bijuu chakra!"

Naruto stared at Sasuke. Tilting his head, the blonde then looked away once he realized what his rival was talking about.

"Oh." Sasuke stated. "There's… no way."

"Now calm down Sas-"

"I LOSE _my_ Rinnegan being forced back through time for _some_ reason I am almost absolutely _sure_ is your fault..."

" **He's not entirely wrong**."

"… but to add to that, you managed to keep your Bijuu chakra?! How in the hell is that even fair?"

"Listen Sasuke. I didn't make up the rules for this."

"Are you sure?" Sasuke asked deliriously. "Because it sure as hell seems that way!"

"Wait no, really. Think about it! If I were gonna drag you back in time with me, why would I – the master prankster of Konoha – then take away your powers? We could use it to mess with people!"

Sasuke stopped to consider it. That did make sense. Looking at his left arm, the Uchiha attempted to move it. Realizing he could, he manifested chakra around it as well.

"Sasuke!"

"Just because you have a point doesn't mean I want to beat your blonde little skull in any less!" Sasuke screamed. "In some way, no matter how small, this is still your fault! And you can be assured I'm gonna beat you for it!"

Naruto rubbed his temple. "Why. I don't feel up to it Sasuke."

"That's a lie!" Sasuke screamed.

"Okay, it is!" Naruto admitted. "But I really can't!"

"And why not?" Sasuke asked. "This is the one time I _really_ need it."

"Because," Naruto started. "The gods won't allow it."

"What the hell does Grandpa Sage have to do with it?"

" **There are apparently powers other than Grandpa**."

"What? There are?" Sasuke asked. Naruto did a double take.

"You can hear him?" Naruto asked. "Outside my head?"

"Of course I can! I always could!"

"Bullshit!" Naruto yelled. "I'm pretty sure you never displayed that little trait before."

"Just because you haven't noticed doesn't mean I haven't."

"Name one time."

"During your wedding," Sasuke stated factually. "Kyuubi and I discussed the cake."

"And where was I?"

"Your attention was elsewhere. Namely Hinata."

"Ahh," Naruto commented. "Makes sense."

" **Shut it kit. The grown ups are talking** ," growled the Kyuubi. Naruto pouted, but did not argue. " **There are actual higher beings known as gods**." Kyuubi addressed Sasuke. The boy nodded.

"And they… don't want us fighting?"

"No." Naruto answered. "They really want things to go the same."

"I see," Sasuke nodded. "And why exactly are we obliging?"

Naruto opened his mouth, then closed it when he realized he didn't have an answer. Sasuke took this as an invitation to continue.

"I mean, I don't really want to be here, and I assume neither do you." Naruto shook his head. "Then why are we playing along? From what I can gather we were both dragged here against our will."

" **About right**." Kyuubi assented.

"So why do we care about what _they_ want?"

"If we don't play along, they reset everything and we just do it all over again." Naruto argued. Sasuke shook his head.

"So? Eventually they'll get bored."

" **There's also the problem of them just wiping us out**." Kyuubi chipped in. " **That's a very real threat**."

Naruto and Sasuke both looked at the fox, then shrugged, turning back to one another and restarting the conversation.

" **Do either of you even understand the concept of fear?** "

"So here's what I propose," Sasuke started. "We power up, then have a quick punch out until one of us goes down. That's you by the way, idiot."

"Bite me, bastard," Naruto retorted.

"And eventually when we mess things up enough, the powers-that-be reset everything and we go for round two. Sound good?"

Naruto turned the idea over in his head. Eventually, he nodded at the plan. "Sounds good. I've been meaning to stretch my legs for quite a bit now." The boy then started to break out into stretches. "Even before I was brought back, I haven't had a really equal spar in so long. Sakura and Hinata are strong and all, don't get me wrong. There just isn't really a fair challenge in them."

Sasuke smirked. "I agree. No one outside of the Kage can stay in the fight for more than ten minutes at most; even then I have to hold back in order to prevent them from dying." Around here the purple chakra started to spread throughout the rest of the Uchiha's body, forming a ghastly skeleton. Eyes glowing, the Susanoo warrior grew solid skin, then armor before its torso lifted from the ground and legs appeared.

"But with you, idiot, I'm sure you will at least talk the Reaper into letting you get a rematch?" Naruto smiled back.

"I'll be sure to let him know to give you another shot." Naruto then looked inward. "Kurama. Are you ready to knock some Uchiha hide around?"

" **Always have been**." Kyuubi growled, a malicious grin on his face. Not a single second afterward did a miasma of full blown bijuu chakra explode from the blonde. The amount and density was far more than before, and within seconds Naruto stood inside of a rendition of Kurama's true form. The unfinished bridge groaned under the new weight of the two chakra constructs as they stared each other down. Luckily neither boy deigned to use their full size. Such things easily dwarfed mountains.

"Ready you two?"

"Re **ady** du **mb** a **ss**!" Kurama and Naruto shouted.

The two then dashed to each other, a clawed hand ready to meet a purple chakra sword.

The resulting shockwave cracked the bridge.

XxX

Kakashi lost his footing, tripping as what seemed to be an earthquake ravaged the island. Because of this, Kakashi's aim was slightly off, and his second Chidori missed his target's heart. Instead it hit Zabuza's shoulder, and the man was forced to limp away clutching his wound. Zabuza glared at the Copy Ninja. Said Copy Ninja did not care. His attention was focused elsewhere.

Dense, powerful chakra radiated from the side of the bridge where he left his students. Even now, the cyclops could feel the powerful vibrations echoing across the field from a collision of two powers he couldn't even fathom. Massive, heavy blows rocked bridge and sea alike, and concern for his students was the first thing that came to mind.

"What is that?" Kakashi thought as another tremor rocked the bridge. Whatever it was, why it chose to suddenly appear and wreck havoc on this bridge in particular stumped him. Whatever the reason, however, he still had to protect his children, so with a heavy heart the man turned back to the missing nin.

"I don't have time for this," Kakashi stated simply. "Take that wound as a sign of good bearing and get out of here." Zabuza scoffed.

"I don't take pity, Copy Ninja," Zabuza refuted. "Death in battle is an honor for Mist Ninja." As such the Demon of the Hidden Mist tightened his grip on his sword.

Kakashi frowned. "Are you insane? You are crippled and tired. Barely at half of your fighting strength would be a generous overstatement of where you are right now. Take your losses and live to fight another day."

"I don't _want_ to live to fight another day," Zabuza spat back. "We are ending this. Here and now." And with that the Mist swordsman dashed forward. One arm hanging uselessly at his side while the other dragged his massive cleaver behind him, Zabuza was on Kakashi in seconds, using the entire weight of his body to swing the sword in a massive overhead arc. It was wide and slow, so Kakashi didn't need to do much to avoid it. Dodging underneath, the Konoha ninja jabbed Zabuza twice in the abdomen, making the already weakened ninja reel.

Kakashi looked over the ninja, sad eyes staring down over him. "Why are you doing this? I didn't take you for the idiotic type." Zabuza laughed.

"Really? That's funny, cause' I definitely took you tree huggers as the sympathetic type." Lowering his head, the man fell to his knees. "End it."

Kakashi shook his head. "Tell me why you are so eager to die." This question earned another chuckle.

"Is this really the time to find out? I thought you were worried about your students?" Zabuza raised his head to stare off to the other side of the bridge. It was naturally foggy in Wave Country, so the far side wasn't clearly visible, but the sheer amount of power radiating from the direction was almost impossible to ignore. "Even I can feel that pressure. Whatever is over there fighting is far beyond either of us. Definitely beyond your students."

"Hn," Kakashi grunted, lowering his headband. He was already tired from his fight with Zabuza, and he would need the chakra to flail uselessly at whatever powerhouses were duking it out near his students. "They can handle themselves for a bit. If they're not dead already they can survive until I hear you out. After all," Kakashi started, his voice ominous. "Its not very often you hear the last words of a dead man."

At this, Zabuza's eyes widened. After a few seconds he started to chuckle, before his head flew back and the man launched into a bellowing laughter.

"You Leaf ninja disgust me," Zabuza spoke through gritted teeth. "I have to admit though; you tree huggers sure are entertaining."

Kakashi put his knife to Zabuza's neck. "I don't think you're in the proper position to be taunting me." Zabuza erupted into laughter once more.

"Somehow," Zabuza stated between chuckles, "threats from a Leaf ninja are a little _less_ than intimidating. Don't be too insulted though. Even had you not been from Konoha I would not have been scared. I accepted my death long ago."

"I let you go free. You could have le-"

"And gone where, Hatake?" Zabuza spat out. "I'm a 'traitor' to the one place I love most. What do you think my life is like, Copy Ninja? Do you think I go from job to job living a carefree schedule I set myself? Heh. You couldn't be _more_ wrong."

Zabuza's eyes narrowed. Kakashi stared him in them unflinching. He knew that missing ninja didn't have exactly _easy_ lives, but he figured they had to have _some_ benefits.

"Nothing I have ever done since I left the Mist has been of my own choice." Zabuza continued. His voice gained a tinge of sadness and regret. "Not even the action of me leaving was something I wanted. Ever since then I have been on the run. When I work, its to the whim of whatever lowlife decided to hire a missing ninja. When I sleep is decided by whenever the Hunter Ninja have decided to leave me alone. What I eat is decided by the grocers, who could poison the food for the bounty on my head. Did you think having a reputation would make things easier? It doesn't. It makes it worse."

Zabuza then sighed heavily. Releasing his grip on his cleaver, the Mist Ninja used his good hand to grab at the wrappings that covered the lower part of his face. Yanking harshly, the man pulled them off in a single motion. They fell to the ground, and with a bloody smile the man looked Kakashi in the eye once more.

"I used to be a veneered and respected warrior, Kakashi Hatake. Men and women alike would both fear and chant my name as I walked through my hometown. And you want to know something? I loved it. I used to _wave_ at them, Hatake. I would wave at the beautiful young children and the beaming wives as I passed them on the way to my Mizukage after a successful mission. I loved protecting and slaughtering for them. I… I loved them all. My country, my people. All of it. I loved it, no matter how blood stained it was.

"We had terrible tendencies, but in those tendencies we shared a camaraderie for each other. I was a Demon, yes. But I was _their_ demon." Zabuza then chuckled. It was deep and low. "Now look at me. What am I now, Hatake? A sellsword? A missing ninja? No. None of those matter."

Zabuza looked at his hands. They were bloody and scarred from years of swinging a sword almost as heavy as he was. Opening, then closing them repeatedly, the man struggled to hold back a sob. Looking back up, Kakashi had to use all of his willpower to keep himself from gaping at the sheer emotion in the man's eyes.

"I have killed my own people. Every Hunter Ninja sent after me was one of my own. I have cut through swathes of them, Hatake. Literally entire families' worth of young, aspiring ninja have been slain by myself. These people… these _children_ that once looked up to me are now looking up to me from the unmarked graves I have buried them in." Kakashi couldn't restrain his flinch. Zabuza chuckled. "Oh, yes. I have buried every missing ninja I slaughtered. They deserve that much. All they're doing is being loyal. But me? The traitor who have killed every single loyal Mist that has pursued him only has one thing of value to his name."

Zabuza then looked at Haku. His lifeless, vacant eyes seemed to be staring straight through him.

"I have killed even him. Tell me, Hatake. For a man who has killed and betrayed all of his own… What would you call that?"

Kakashi was speechless. Zabuza could see that.

"Allow me to answer that for you then. I am a _kinslayer_. And for a man with such a vibrant love of his country that he was willing to gather funds to rebel against its bastard of a leader… how terrible do you think it is to live every day with that fact?"

Kakashi swallowed. The action felt difficult. Would he be able to do the same? Survive with killing so many of his own?

"Its unbearable," Zabuza continued. "I thought that, maybe, I would live on in the legacy I left with Haku. Once the war was over, I would be able to go off and quietly die while Haku, who has never killed a soul, would be able to live it up as a hero. The poor boy thought himself a tool. In a way, I supposed he was right. I was using him, but even he I loved. Not only as a fellow Mist born ninja, but as a son. Now look at him," Zabuza stared at the boy's body.

"Tell me, Hatake. What do I still have to live for?"

Kakashi realized he could find no reason.

"End it. End my life and my legacy. This was a fine battle and a fine loss. I can see no honor lost in dying to you, Copy Ninja. After all," Zabuza then adjusted the Mist headband on his forehead. It was slashed through. "It is a Mist ninja's honor to die in battle, and though I am a sellsword and a kinslayer, that one thing has never changed."

There was nothing else to say, was there.

Kakashi, resolve strengthened from hearing Zabuza's final words, nodded to the man. Looking the man straight in the eyes, Kakashi revealed his Sharingan once again. There was probably only a handful of ninja as worthy of the name like the man before him.

He would remember it.

Gripping the handle of the kunai tightly, Kakashi prepared himself to swipe its blade across the man's throat. It wasn't an easy way to go, but among ninjas it was the most respectable. Pressing the blade into the man's neck, Kakashi managed to draw some blood when a slimy, high pitched laugh attracted his attention. Both he and Zabuza followed the laugh to the source to find a small man with crazily styled hair standing at another end of the bridge. Behind him stood a small militia of men, all of which had several weapons and bigger smiles.

"Wha-" Kakashi started, before he was interrupted by laughter. Surprisingly, it was from the man in front of him. Zabuza bellowed with a mirth he had not had only seconds ago.

"Ahahahahaaahaaa! So you really did intend to betray me, Gato?" the Mist ninja asked. The short man answered the question with a sneer.

"Not 'betraying' per say. I like to think of it as 'tying up loose ends'. You missing ninja are liars and cheats..."

Kakashi had to take a minute to analyze the hypocrisy in that statement.

"… and its fairly important for a businessman like myself to acknowledge when a partnership is detrimental. You, Zabuza, are detrimental. As such, our contract is terminated. Boys?" Gato motioned with his hand, and all of the mercenaries behind him moved forward at the command. "Not to mention, you charged simply too much."

Kakashi looked at Zabuza. "How much did you charge him, exactly?"

Zabuza looked back. "Enough to finance my revolution. Why?"

Kakashi's eyes widened. "Why the hell would you charge that much to kill a single man?"

"I figured he could afford it!"

"Who could afford to singlehandedly finance an entire war?" Kakashi asked. He was incredulous.

"I can, actually," Gato interrupted. "I'm just really cheap."

Zabuza stared back at Kakashi, a smug grin on his face. "See?" Kakashi rolled his eyes.

"And his acceptance didn't send off any alarms in your head?"

"It did," Zabuza admitted. "I just figured I'd kill him and take the money before he betrayed me. Didn't figure you'd come along, though."

Kakashi rolled his eyes again. "Both of you entered this arrangement intent on betraying the other."

"I'm a ninja/businessman," Gato and Zabuza answered simultaneously. "Its what we do."

Kakashi found no fault with that logic.

"That being said," Zabuza stated. "I do not like the idea of being betrayed, personal intentions notwithstanding." With careful precision, Zabuza snatched the kunai from Kakashi's hands and held it firmly in his teeth. Using his one good arm, the missing ninja gripped the handle of his blade and stood defiant against the small army in front of him.

"Go to your students, Kakashi." Zabuza grunted around the kunai in his mouth. Kakashi shook his head.

"Are you planning on fighting that alone? You won't come out alive."

Turning, Zabuza stared the Leaf ninja down. His eyes were bloodthirsty and manic, but somehow still conveyed the message the man wanted to get through.

 _That's the plan_

Nodding his head, Kakashi turned and headed in the opposite direction of Gato and his mercenaries. His students had been put on hold for long enough.

"Get him, boys. He's half dead and tired. He won't be able to even nick one of you!" Gato yelled. He was answered by a chorus of yells. In mismatched unison the men charged forward, excited in the prospect of killing a ninja. Zabuza, who was losing blood very quickly, wobbled a bit as nausea and blood loss addled his mind. In all honesty, the man shouldn't even be able to stand.

But the thing about ninja is that they don't act how they're supposed to.

Kakashi could hear the exact moment the band of mercenaries met Zabuza's defiant last stand. A loud, bone chilling yell of pain echoed throughout the bridge as the first mercenary met the Seven Swordsman. Kakashi turned his head, keeping in his stride.

The mercenary who screamed had his arm chopped off. The others were too decapitated to scream properly. This was achieved in a single swing.

"Listen here, you maggots!" Zabuza yelled. "I am The DEMON of the Hidden Mist! And you all," Zabuza pointed out over the crowd with his cleaver. "Are already dead."

It was an understatement to say the men were spooked. Gato was one such man. Slowly, the man started to retreat.

"Its time for me to leave," Gato whispered, starting to walk away.

"Well that won't do." Kakashi mumbled. With a quick glance at Zabuza, Kakashi could see that the man was cleaving through the untrained men by the dozens. Twisting and turning and slashing, the man was receiving blows here and there, but was running through the army regardless. However fast he was moving though, he wouldn't get through them all in his dance of death before Gato escaped. Coming to a conclusion, the man stopped his stride and turned back to the carnage. Sharingan working overtime, the man pulled a kunai out from his hip pouch and took careful aim through the men fighting.

"Careful..." Kakashi chanted. Slowly lightning chakra seeped into the blade, giving it a slow crackle. There on the bridge the Copy Ninja stood, until an opportunity presented itself.

"There!" Kakashi shouted, and like a bullet the blade left his hands. Piercing through the air like a knife through butter, the kunai sailed around every person in the way, before burying itself in Gato's leg. Because of the lightning chakra the blade didn't even stop there, going through cartilage and skin alike after discharging all of its electricity.

"Gah!" Gato screamed, before falling to the ground clutching his wound. He seemed to be undergoing a spasm.

"Boss!" a nearby mercenary yelled. Quickly, the man tried to help his boss to his feet. As soon as he touched him, however, the man was electrocuted. He fell to the ground in a crumpled heap.

"What?" another mercenary yelled. A sense of dread soon overcame him however. Looking up, the man followed the killing intent to a fearsome sight.

Zabuza, covered entirely in blood that was only partially his own, stood surrounded by terrified mercenaries. The man, despite his position, seemed nonplussed at the men around him, and instead seemed intent on promising the most amount of pain through a stare alone. The mercenary, a wise man by his own family's standards, did the only sensible thing.

"I don't get paid enough." This was the mercenary's sole statement as he ditched his boss in favor of living. Gato lay on the ground in pain. Spasms from the electricity coursing through him prevented him from speaking. True, the man could barely move at all. However, one could assume he was cursing his fleeing employee.

"That was my parting gift, Zabuza." Kakashi stated, mostly to himself. This being the case, Zabuza still turned and exchanged a glance with the cyclops. Nodding, the two experienced ninja shared a moment of mutual respect before returning to their previous engagements.

Kakashi continued to run towards his students.

Zabuza continued to use his two blades to massively murder multiple miscreants. That was alliteration for "kill everything."

XxX

Running with all the speed and chakra he could funnel into his legs, Kakashi turned over plans on how to get his students out of dodge as well as the events he just went through.

He was a genius. These were things he could do.

Boy, did Kakashi have a lot to think about though. Zabuza, as traitorous as he was, was still both a fine man and a fine ninja. Despite being a Missing Ninja from what could possibly be the most brutal hidden village, he was still a novel person with dreams, aspirations, and most of all a love for his country. These were admiral traits, and if Zabuza could have them, then what about other missing ninja?

What about missing ninja from his own home of the Hidden Leaf? True, they didn't have that many, but of the few they did, could they still be like Zabuza? Goal driven with a love of their own country, but fleeing because of some unspeakable injustice? Could Itachi be –

No, now was not the time to think of such things, Kakashi mused. Pushing a little more chakra to his legs, Kakashi dead sprinted the last few minutes with all but two thoughts going through his head.

I am to save my students and…

"I will forever remember you, Zabuza Momochi."

These words were said full of conviction and promise, for it was the least he could do to remember such a man. Unfortunately, they were said upon arriving on the scene of giant orange and purple monstrosities duking it out with each other. Turning, both constructs moved to stare at their sensei.

And Kakashi? Kakashi stared at his two students.

"Wha-" was all Kakashi was able to say, before a blinding flash of light engulfed him and the world turned white.

Unfortunately, Kakashi would be unable to keep his promise.


	10. Chapter 10: Plot: Start

_**Nothing much this time. Here's some plot. Nothing else to say really.**_

 _ **Wow, this is a first.**_

* * *

Onyx eyes surveyed the area. Time seemed to be frozen, with the debris from his and Naruto's previous attack being stuck in midair. Everywhere he looked seemed to be stuck in a single position, as if a person had taken a black and white picture of the area and they were stuck in it.

Sasuke turned to Naruto, who was now lounging against the guard rail near the side of the bridge. "What is this?"

Naruto raised an eyebrow. "That's right. You've just gotten here." Naruto swept an arm out, indicating the bridge that was now frozen in time. "Remember when I said that the gods would just reset everything? This is how they do it. They trap us in some kind of purgatory while they put the world back together around us. In a bit everything will slowly start to mend back to a certain point the gods believe was the _least_ messed up by our meddling. Spots will be indicated for us to stand, and then bam! Action. Time is restarted."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow as well. "That's an awful roundabout way of doing things."

"Maybe," Naruto mused. "But it works. Also it gives me a chance to talk to-"

Naruto was interrupted when a wreath of flames appeared above him. Fire crackling as it impossibly whirled in the air, the smell of brimstone became apparent as the orange flames contorted into a shape. Sasuke looked on impassively, Sharingan activated in case something dangerous appeared from within the miasma of flame and hate. Naruto looked as well.

Then he moved to the side.

"I'm not falling for this again," Naruto grumbled as he moved from directly underneath it.

The flames writhed and whistled, until a shape that could be described as vaguely _Naruto_ was formed in it. It twisted and bent until more and more features could be seen, before stopping on a near perfect replica of the blonde Hokage, sans the orange jumpsuit. The apparition looked around, before noticing Naruto. Shifting slightly, it transfixed itself directly over the orange manchild and then dropped, the flames dying away to reveal a Kyuubi-like Naruto which was now on top of the real one.

Said perversion of nature laughed at Naruto's misfortune, before sparing a glance up. Red eyes meeting red eyes, Kurama simply laughed at the Uchiha's presence.

" **I see you've been dragged in here too** ," Kurama stated, a cheeky smile on his face. " **That m** **akes a lot of sense. Everyone involved with the past seems to be able to exist in this… purgatory**."

Sasuke tilted his head. "Why are you so small too? Can't you control your form?" Kyuubi shot a dark look at his container.

" **I asked the same question**."

"Why do you people assume I know the answer to these kinds of things?" Sasuke shook his head.

"Honestly, I don't know. You don't know the answer to simple math, let alone the theories of quantum and temporal physics in relation to chakra sustained entities." Naruto scowled.

"You threw in some unnecessary words in there on purpose."

"Maybe, but it still messed with you."

Naruto scowled, but didn't respond. Smirking, Sasuke acknowledged his victory for what it was. "So what were you saying before Kyuubi dropped in?"

"I was saying that being here gives me a chance to talk with _him_."

"Him?" Sasuke asked. "Do you mean Kyuubi? Don't you talk with him all the time?"

Kyuubi shook his head. Perched on top of Naruto's now prone body, the fox seemed rather comfortable using his host as a couch. He even started picking at his nails. " **No. Not me. There's another person here with us. Usually he's here by now though**."

"Another person? Who could that be?"

On cue a flash of light exploded from the air in the middle of the bridge. When the flash subsided, Neji emerged, confused and slightly disoriented. Dropping to the ground and landing on a knee, the Hyuuga looked around before settling on Naruto. He immediately formed realization.

"Oh, its just you again. What do you need this time Naru-" Neji started, but was momentarily distracted by the sight of another person in the time void. The pure white eyes of Neji's met the pure black ones of Sasuke and silence pervaded the landscape.

Sasuke was the first to break said silence. With a sneer, the man-turned-boy addressed the one in front of him. Three tomoe spun in each eye as he stared down the person across the bridge. "Hyuuga."

Veins bulged around Neji's eyes as he responded in kind to the open hostility. "Uchiha. I didn't expect _you_ of all people to be here. Did Naruto drag you back here too?" Sasuke's eyes momentarily darted to Naruto, who was rather enjoying the scene. Focusing with a deadly intent, Naruto decidedly stopped enjoying it as much. After a few seconds of a potent glare, the Uchiha turned his attention back to Neji, who just stared him down, his face perfectly impassive.

"I was told that the idiot had no idea how I ended up in this situation. You're saying you were brought here?"

"I was," Neji responded. A smirk appeared on his face. "You appear disgruntled Uchiha. Were you _upset_ by this turn of development? I wasn't."

Sasuke, who was scowling slightly at the thought of Naruto's possible deception, fixed his face. It was once again a picture of complete disinterest. "I admit I was annoyed, but nothing to disrupt me in any way. As is well known, the Uchiha is the foremost clan in Konoha. Not that you _would_ know that. You didn't survive to see its future."

Neji's brow furrowed slightly, but he otherwise didn't react. "That is true, Uchiha. It appears your clan has learned how not to lie. I did indeed die, but at least I died ensuring the future of said village." Around here Neji gestured towards Naruto. "More than you've done at the time. Last I recalled you were unmistakably _absent_ during a large amount of Konoha's history."

Sasuke's jaw clenched. "I was going through some stuff to ease my soul. I was attempting to avenge my family. My _closely knit_ and _loving_ family. Know anything about that Hyuuga?"

"Why yes," Neji remarked. A sneer was evident in his eyes, but nowhere else on his face, which was like a stone slab. "I had a loving cousin and a doting uncle, beginnings notwithstanding. Frankly, I'm surprised _you_ know what a loving family was like. Weren't your beginnings… ah… a little rough? A whole night of rough?"

Naruto and Kyuubi both winced at that. Sasuke almost did, but managed to keep his face featureless.

" **Are they… are they having** **an Impassive-Off**?"

"Seems like it. This is getting a bit much though. Was there any hatred between the Uchiha and Hyuuga clans? I don't remember any."

" **I can imagine no other reason for such venom**."

"Well, whatever the reason, this is getting good. No reason to stop."

"My clan may have been… reduced… to a fraction of its glory, but it is now on its way back to its old stature," Sasuke grunted. "How is yours doing? Last I checked your heiress mated with the class idiot."

"Except that," Naruto grunted, getting ready to stand up. He was held down by Kurama.

" **Shush, boy. Its getting good!** "

"Said class idiot is your Hokage now. At least _I've_ never had to answer to him."

"At least _I've_ never lost to him."

"You did that one time!" Naruto yelled. Sasuke shushed him.

"That was an honorable tie!" Neji smirked, his eyebrow raised.

"Getting heckled, Uchiha 'genius'?"

Sasuke's eye twitched. "Fine, Hyuuga. You win this round, but I don't suppose I'd expect anything less from a clan of statues."

"And I wouldn't expect anything more from a clan of emotional wrecks."

"That's it, wanna go ghost eyes?"

"Anytime, pinwheel eyes!"

Neji's comment struck extra hard when Sasuke matured his Sharingan to Mangekyo.

"Hey, Kurama? Let me get in on this. I have some grievances I need to air out as well." Kyuubi dutifully moved. Getting up and stretching, Naruto flared his chakra once or twice before advancing to where the other two boys were heading. On his way there, Nature Chakra manifested itself around Naruto's eyes, turning his pupils into a sideways bar. "Heck yeah, let's mess things up!"

The three boys made their way towards the center. A Rasengan – a twirling, twisting sphere of pure chakra – whirled in Naruto's hand as he approached a meeting point arbitrarily decided in a central point between all three. The sphere spun and twisted, whirring with an obvious, audible whirr. After a while, wind generated from chakra alone begun to spin around it as well, finishing one of Naruto's more dangerous techniques.

"Wind Style: Rasengan!"

Sasuke smirked. Seeing Naruto's technique flare to life, the Uchiha decided to respond in kind. Bearing his left hand to the side, Sasuke focused his chakra to it, before allowing it to permeate and coalesce. Eventually lightning erupted from his clawed hand, crackling and chirping as it remained barely restrained in the boy's clutch. Focusing, the Chidori technique eventually condensed and became more dense. The chakra condensed more and more until the electricity practically screamed to be released, and only then did Sasuke allow the armor of his Susanoo to cover his arm. Now clad in purple chakra, the skeletal hand transferred the power of the Chidori to the Susanoo, effectively allowing the chakra to be released and form an arrowhead.

"I hope you enjoy this; Indra Arrow!"

Naruto smirked. "I see you're becoming serious. Don't you think that's too powerful for a little punch out?"

"For you?" Sasuke asked, his smirk widening. "No."

"Well said," Naruto responded, before looking at his own technique. "Well, I guess I have to respond. Sand Style!"

Sand, from seemingly no where, coalesced from the air and combined with the Wind Natured Rasengan easily due to their shared nature. Halfway to formation however, the sand collapsed and fell away from the Rasengan, returning the ability to its pure Wind form.

"Wh-what?" Naruto asked.

"What's wrong?" Sasuke asked. Naruto was unable to answer.

"I dunno. Let me try again."

Trying again, Naruto attempted to draw on a different Tailed Beast's elemental chakra. Deciding on Son Goku's, Naruto allowed Lava to feed into his Rasengan. The lava flowed easily at first, but then crumbled away once more, leaving only the wind styled attack.

" **Brat, I can't sense much of the others in you anymore**." Kurama commented from the sidelines. Sasuke heard such.

"What? But I thought you retained your Tailed Beast Chakra?"

"I did!" Naruto yelled, looking at his Rasengan. It spun true and fast; even in this form it was a notable source of destruction. Regardless, Naruto stared at it as if it held the answers for his question. "I even used some for that kunai I threw!"

XxX

Speaking of such a kunai, the blade pierced through air shining in a multitude of colors. Arcing through the air in a beautiful path of destruction, the blade – on its way around the world – noticed that everything around it was seemingly stuck in place. Not liking this one bit, the blade changed direction, impossibly again, and set out to find the source of such a blight on its existence.

XxX

" **That might be the problem, brat** ," Kyuubi stated while watching from the sideline. " **Think about it. You shouldn't have the connection to them that you did in the past… Er, future. Whatever. The connection isn't there anymore. What you had** _ **then**_ **is gone** _ **now**_ **. What you put into that kunai was the last of what you had left over in you. Your bijuu chakra is gone now.** " At this, Naruto's brow furrowed. Peering into his wind covered Rasengan, the blonde then raised his hand into the air, and the wind chakra forming a shuriken around the construct widened until its hum turned almost deafening.

"If that's the case, then give me a couple hands Kurama!"

" **I'm only doing this because I'd rather see the Uchiha suffer**."

"You know you love me."

Orange chakra then sprout from the blonde's arm, forming three clawed hands that swiftly went to work on the technique. Two more shuriken started spinning around the Rasengan, joining the horizontal one there before. Spinning diagonally from the original and perpendicular to each other, the humming increased twofold.

"Sage Bijuu Style: Omni-Rasenshuriken!" Naruto yelled with a grin on his face. Seeing the monster technique for what it was, Sasuke couldn't help but grin as well.

"You've been busy, dead last. Can it survive my Arrow though?"

"Survive? This baby can cut through everything!" Naruto yelled. "Not to mention it has a type advantage!"

"Well _my_ arrow can pierce through anything! Are you ready to see which one would win?" Naruto nodded ecstatically.

"This shuriken has been known to cut through _atoms_. Good luck, bastard."

Then both boys turned to the third in the group. Hyuuga Neji stood there, gaping at the sheer power emanating from both boys' techniques. To be fair, Neji supposed that the man who would go on to become Hokage _would_ be suitably powerful. Even back during the war, Naruto wielded the Kyuubi's power to an unimaginable degree, proving himself to be one of the strongest shinobi of the time even back then.

And, to cite another point, the man who purportedly fought such a character to a standstill would also be suitably strong.

This however… this was insane.

Apparently both boys had grown in power exponentially since Neji's last real encounter with them, as they now toted weapons and abilities that eclipsed even the last ones he remembered. The crackling of Sasuke's technique – "Indra's Arrow" he called it – and the humming of Naruto's Omni-Rasenshuriken together was simply deafening, and just being in the vicinity of the two put an enormous pressure of chakra on the young teen. Even now, before the two gargantuan techniques even met each other, could the residual aura of pure power be seen battling for dominance. Black electricity, for it seemed to be the Uchiha's theme color, sparked and struck at the ground and air in various directions, only to be cut by the erroneous blades of wind that leaked off of Naruto's technique. The very action of cutting said bolt of lightning however was enough to dispel the wind, leaving the two techniques at an impasse.

Frankly, Neji wasn't sure he wanted to butt heads with either boy anymore.

Sasuke glared at the Uchiha, before sneering. "What's the matter Hyuuga? Are you getting cold feet?"

"Of course not, Uchiha," Neji countered, though his voice was unsure. "I'm just thinking of a way to counteract this… technique of yours. The Hyuuga have many abilities in our arsenal. I'm just thinking of which one to use."

"Is that so?" Sasuke responded. His voice had a condescending, knowing tone to it, as if he knew exactly that Neji couldn't respond in kind. His sneer widening, he chose to rub salt in the wound. "Naruto and I have been using techniques like these for _years_. In our last serious clash, we destroyed the Valley of the End and completely restructured the landscape. Do you have anything that can match that?"

Neji swallowed hard. Restructured the _landscape_? That was First Hokage levels of power! This was the state of the two boys when they were _weakened_? What were they like at full power?

"Perhaps," Neji lied through his teeth.

"Really? That's so cool, Neji! It took Sasuke and I several years to come up with this kind of power and control. You really _were_ a genius, Neji!" Naruto looked at Neji with sparkling eyes.

Put off by Naruto's enthusiasm, Neji felt a pit of anxiety in his stomach.

"Why yes, truly the Hyuuga are a clan of _geniuses_ ," Sasuke said, dragging out the last word. Sarcasm dripped off his every word. Naruto turned to glare at him.

"Not this again, Sasuke! We _just_ ended the… whatever it was… that you two were doing! Where is this all even coming from? You were never like this towards Hinata, or Bolt or Himawari! They're part Hyuuga too. Himawari even has the Byakugan!"

Neji's eyes darted back to Naruto. His glare towards Sasuke was turned into a look of incredulity at the young Hokage. Naruto and Hinata's – daughter, was it? – had inherited the Byakugan? Neji wasn't a bloodline freak like the likes of maybe Danzo or Orochimaru, but even he was intrigued at the potential behind the potent chakra of an Uzumaki combined with the bloodline limit of a Hyuuga.

"They don't count, Idiot," Sasuke responded, oblivious to Neji's shocked expression. "The children also have half of _you_ in them. My animosity towards the Hyuuga would be far outclassed by my indifference towards you. Besides, its impossible to hate _Hinata_ of all people. She's just too much of a..."

"Perfect, beautiful angel?" Naruto responded for him.

"… In not quite so many words, yes. Quite"

"Even so," Naruto continued without missing a beat, "Whatever transgression you two have against each other can be put on hold. I won't have it tainting the purity of what we have before us."

"We're about to punch each other with definite, lethal techniques with the ability to kill everything bar the strongest of bijuus."

" **That's me**." Kyuubi piped up from the sideline.

"Quite," Sasuke responded. "Speaking of which, where _is_ your bijuu busting technique, Hyuuga?"

Neji, who had been absorbed in the dialogue switch, immediately started sweating upon his repositioning in the spotlight. Engaged in the conversation, Neji completely forgot about the deadly fisticuffs he was being commissioned to join.

"Give me a second," Neji mumbled. Going over his techniques in his head, Neji realized that while his Gentle Fist technique was unrivaled, bar none, it was more of a… normal shinobi's fighting style. Not the kind of thing that would be suitable to the all-out warhead capabilities of the two before him.

It was like bringing a gun to an atomic bomb fight.

Still, the Hyuuga boy had to come up with a technique that would seem even remotely on the same level as the dense, destructive weapons before him. Looking over his known abilities, Neji was forced to admit he had no such technique. His Kaiten, while strong, was a stationary move. If he were as unfathomablely powerful as the two before him, he might have supposed it would stand a chance. He wasn't, however, and he doubted he could defend against an arrow that could pierce anything and a shuriken that sliced atoms.

So that left his Eight Trigrams, Sixty Four Palms. Somehow, he doubted that he would survive long after attempting to poke either of those monstrosities, especially after they clashed. Seeing no other option in sight, Neji began to panic, when a thought came to mind.

Positioning his arms to his side, bending at the elbow in a perfect ninety degree angle, Neji braced himself before channeling chakra to his hands. The chakra pooled and churned, roiling around inside before exploding outward. Focusing on molding the errant power, Neji focused as hard as he could to direct the chakra into behaving how he wanted it to. It took some getting used to, but eventually Neji managed to cause the chakra to form two intricate tiger heads around his hands.

"Hey, isn't that..."

"That's Hinata's technique!" Naruto screamed, realization dawning in his eyes. "So you stole the Lion Step from her?"

"S-stole?" Neji stammered. "No! If anything, this is my technique as much as it is hers! True, she came up with the idea, but I walked her through its execution and theory. Its only natural that I would know it after helping her with it after so long!" Neji then looked down at his own hands, positioned perfectly and rigidly at his side. Though his form was perfect, and Neji was confident in his control as a Hyuuga, Hinata was simply _better_ than him at certain things. Those certain things included chakra control, and as such his Tigers fluctuated every time Neji lost a bit of focus. "I always focused on power over finesse, though. So while Hinata perfected the technique and made a perfect replica out of it, I drew something else."

And it was here that Neji's stance brought him closer to the ground in his stance. Preparing himself, Neji brought out a low, soft yell as he funneled more and more chakra into the Twin Lions. Their features blurred, expanding outwards with more and more energy until the visage of their original form was more of a suggestion than anything. This being the case, the Lions' manes now covered most of Neji's arms, and the heads themselves were now bulbous, swirling behemoths twice the size of what they were before.

"I have to thank you, Naruto. This technique was based partly on your technique. After seeing it, I wanted to have a powerful ability just like it, in case I ever needed a trump card. It can't demolish things like normal Rasengan, but used on anything chakra based will completely decimate whatever it hits." Neji then smiled at Sasuke. "Quite like your attacks."

"Hold up, aren't you underestimating the gravity of the situation? True, your attack is impressive, but aren't you forgetting something? That little trick will only work if what you're canceling _isn't_ so massively stronger than what its fighting. Your attack isn't even near what Naruto and I have."

"You seem scared," Neji stated simply.

"Yeah. Scared, Sasuke?" Naruto parroted. Sasuke gained an enlarged vein on his forehead.

"You know what? I don't care anymore. Time to see if we can die here." And like that, Sasuke took off. Seeing that things were starting, Naruto quickly followed suit. Neji stood there, looking at his unsure technique as it flickered between being recognizable and not. Steeling himself, the Hyuuga took off after the two, his attack paling in comparison to the much larger things before him. After only a few seconds he found himself staring down the two abilities that, even now, clashed with titanic pressure. Realizing his mistake for what it was, Neji could feel his mortality dawning on him. Not one to back down from a decision, no matter how terrible, Neji simply closed his eyes and pushed his modified Twin Lion Step technique forward.

Only to be immediately blown back.

"Ugh, ow!" Neji yelled as he tumbled across the time frozen bridge. Eventually his momentum died and he was able to sit upright. Looking around, the boy was able to make his bearings. Apparently he wasn't the only one to be catapulted, as Naruto and Sasuke – techniques canceled and dissipated – lay in similar heaps in directions equally far away from the impact site. Floating midair at said site, the Sage of Six Paths resided. Grimacing at Naruto especially, the venerated man spoke.

"It seems I can't even leave you alone in the _past_ and hope that you won't get in trouble."

Naruto chuckled while still prone on the ground. Sasuke didn't have as good a nature.

"Hey, Gramps."

"Why does no one show the _literal_ progenitor of chakra and ninja society any respect?" Neji asked. He was collectively ignored.

"Do you have _any_ idea why I'm in the past? Naruto told me it had something to do with you and some other gods or whatever. I think its HIS fault. Which one of us is right?"

The sage, after sparing Naruto a second, final glare, turned to his other descendent with a sigh.

"In a way, both of you are."

" **Pardon?** " Kyuubi asked, his piqued curiosity dragging him out of his languidness. " **How is that so?** "

The Sage of Six Paths rubbed his temple. This would be a long conversation and, considering its participants, likely aggravating.

"Do you remember when you first met your teacher the second time around?" the Sage asked. Naruto nodded his head.

"Of course, gramps. It went well."

" **If you could call that** **'** **well** **'** ," Kyuubi muttered. The Sage caught on to it.

"I'll have to agree with Kurama's sarcasm on this. Whatever happened during the greeting period of Team Seven the second time around was anything _but_ 'well'. Because of some… circumstance… that the gods are refusing to admit, Sasuke was irreparably scarred. He started changing, going down a path that he wasn't meant to, at least this early." The Sage then turned to Sasuke, who felt suddenly uncomfortable under the gaze. "Of course, this is no problem. Like every other thing you've tried to change, the gods would simply change things back and restart the timeline."

"I fail to see the connection. How did I end up back here?"

"Ah, yes," the Sage muttered. "Unfortunately, because of that… occurrence… every time we tried to reverse the timeline to fix Sasuke, he would inevitably be "snagged" on it, anchoring himself to where he was and remaining unchangeable. Because of this, the Sasuke of the past became glitched, and we were forced to make him catatonic to stop any forced changes. We already had _one_ troublemaker going around making things difficult. We didn't need another."

At these last words every available pair of eyes turned to Naruto. He chuckled nervously.

Sasuke continued the conversation. "Somehow, I can't shake the feeling that you were the one who messed up the past me. You're lucky you didn't change me forever."

"What do you mean?" Neji asked.

"Naruto did something to change me, or at least the past me, Hyuuga. I still feel fine, so whatever it is that he did during the first meeting didn't change me too much before I was brought back, so I can overlook it. If it had however, I'd be furious."

"What the hell are you talking ab-" Naruto started, before realization dawned. "That's right. We never told you either. This is an alternate dimension. What we do here doesn't affect our timeline." Sasuke quirked an eyebrow.

"It doesn't?"

"No. It doesn't," Naruto responded.

"So Sakura and Sarada are..."

"They're frozen in time in our original world, just like you were before you were brought back, for whatever reason."

"Wait, you named your daughter _Salad_?"

"Oh? What did you name _your_ daughter, Hyuuga?"

There was silence.

"I apologize," Sasuke mumbled. Neji, albeit in a slightly raspy voice, responded.

"Its fine."

"Indeed," Hagoromo responded from his place floating. He had not moved, and instead was patiently waiting for the sidetracked conversation to return to its place. He was starting to run out of patience. "Are you guys done?"

The Sage was met with nods. Sighing, he continued.

"I'm already starting to doubt the gods' decision in this whole matter. I know they act completely on a whim, but you lot tend to get distracted far too easily for this plan to go anywhere near to how its supposed to.

"Anyway, our solution to the Sasuke plan was only temporary. It was better than letting his altered, irreversible alternative run around, but a catatonic Sasuke itself was a change to the timeline. Things were being altered because of the boy's change in demeanor, and there was no way to fix it without referring back to its problem, which in itself couldn't be fixed. After a while, the changes were spiraling out of control, and the decision to bring the original back became a much more viable option." Hagoromo turned to Sasuke. "Having you in the past to act it out, no matter how reluctantly, was deemed more satisfactory than not."

Sasuke didn't like the sound of that. This being the case, he accepted it in stride. A burning question came to the front of his mind, however.

"Wait, then in all of that, what exactly did Naruto contribute to make me come back?"

Hagoromo gained a creepy smile on his face.

"For that, you should ask Naruto. Either way, congratulations. Welcome to your new hell."

And like that, the Sage was gone.

Put off by the Sage's parting words, Sasuke turned to his best friend and rival with a confused expression on his face. Seeing as Sasuke, even in the past, barely emoted beyond annoyance, this was a difficult thing to perceive. Having known the man for so long, however, Naruto was easily able to make out the expression.

"Hmm?" Naruto gestured. Sasuke shook his head.

"You should already know the question I want to ask. You've hung around Shikamaru enough. At least _some_ of his brains should have rubbed off on you."

Neji, who was now forgotten on the sidelines, momentarily pondered on what happened to Shikamaru. He would have to ask about him later.

"Hmm," Naruto pondered. He was sitting on the ground, legs crossed, as he held a hand to his chin and thought. "You probably want to know what happened during the first Team Seven meeting that may have affected you to know what part I had in bringing you back?"

Sasuke rolled his eyes at the elaborate explanation. "That would be correct, dead last."

"Well, the answer to that question would be that I don't know."

"What do you mean, 'you don't know?'" Sasuke asked. He was incredulous.

"I mean that I have no idea! As far as I know, everything went the same as it did last time! Sakura talked about how much she was in love with you..."

Sasuke shuddered at the thought of his wife's stalking habits. Her _old_ stalking habits…

.

.

.

Dear gods he hoped it was her _old_ stalking habits. Thinking over their relationship however, Sasuke remembered the fact that his wife had elected to go on a top secret, definitely lethal mission just in order to spend some time with him. Nothing out of the ordinary, especially considering the high class and level of ninja that both spouses turned out to be.

No, what was out of the ordinary was that the woman was pretty obviously _terminally pregnant with his daughter at the time_. So much so that Sarada was then born on that very same mission.

Taking a second, Sasuke shuddered once more at the thought of what exactly the kind of woman he decided to marry.

Of course, Naruto caught none of this and continued his explanation, "Then you started complaining and going _yadda blah blah blah_ about being a big wuss."

"I'll have you know that I was preoccupied with the extremely important task of avenging my clan. All of that 'complaining' was necessary when I had to kill someone as competent as..." Sasuke petered off. Realizing something, the dusk eyed boy fell to the ground, his legs giving way under the gravity of his revelation.

"Naruto, Itachi is..."

"Yeah, he's alive. Whatever. Its my part of the story now so listen up," Naruto interrupted, completely uncaring of his best friend's emotional state.

"I will kill you one day," Sasuke muttered while standing up.

"Yes yes, I love you too. So anyway, after you were done bitching about killing your brother or whatever, I went. I introduced myself..."

" **Which you now have ninja introduction cards for** ," Kyuubi snickered.

"Oh, you made them back in the past too? I just used them to explain Naruto whenever I couldn't be bothered. Glad to see they're being put to use now as well."

"… and gave a little speech. You went all 'log' on us afterwards, and now here we are. Honestly you probably showed more emotion as a vegetable than you did normally."

" **Also, he did a dumbed down version of the Talk no Jutsu**."

"Oh, yeah. And that too!"

Sasuke froze.

"You… did… what?" Sasuke asked slowly, fear creeping into his voice. "Why the hell would you use Talk no Jutsu in our first meeting? Didn't Kakashi ban that?"

"He didn't ban it in _this_ timeline!" Naruto screamed in protest.

"It doesn't matter! You know how dangerous it is! No wonder the gods couldn't reverse the damage! You can't reverse _that_ forbidden abomination!"

"Well how the hell was I supposed to know that my technique could alter reality affecting abilities of gods?"

"You weren't..." Sasuke admitted, "But that hardly matters. You shouldn't be using it regardless! There is no reason or excuse you could possibly make that could justify using that!"

"You know that I don't do it on purpose! It just kinda-"

"Yeah, I'm signing off from this conversation."

And just like that Hyuuga Neji disappeared in a flash of light.

Naruto and Sasuke had broken into a fist fight. A brawl more than anything, the two fought well until the time stop ended.


	11. Chapter 11: Welcome Back to Konoha

_**Hey everyone! Sorry for the late update! Its been a ride. Classes have started up again, and I haven't had enough time to write as much as I would've wanted to. Combine that with my job search (writing doesn't pay and put food on the table, even though I would like it to) and you get very little time to do a VERY MANY thing.**_

 _ **That being said, I love you guys and the constant support. Writing is a beloved hobby and I'm happy I have you guys to share this with.**_

 _ **THAT being said, thank you to OriksGaming for the constructive criticism. We talked and he helped me fix the "its" and "it's" problem I was having. I, like everyone else who enjoys the art, would like to improve in my writing. I do dream of pursuing this professionally, so any help is appreciated. Keep it constructive, and together we can make me a better author, who in turn can write you guys much better stories.**_

 _ **Because in the end, its you guys that matter.**_

 _ **Though I do take immense joy in writing, lol.**_

 _ **Because of the lateness of this chapter, I will try to get another one out much sooner. Maybe later on this week? We'll see. Otherwise expect the nearly weekly basis of before. Thank you again guys!**_

* * *

The air was sweet with the scent of dew and wet grass as Team Seven made their way through the forests that surrounded the Hidden Leaf. Rain had just barely settled not too long before the group departed from their completed mission, leaving the sun to poke out through patches of dirty gray clouds. This same sun shone rays of golden sunlight down through the canopy of leaves overhead, giving the path that the four walked on a somber mood.

Naruto, of course, could only yawn at such a sight.

"I can't believe they still named it after you," Sasuke grumbled. He shuffled along beside his blonde haired best friend as they trailed behind Sakura and Kakashi. They walked just slow enough to be out of earshot, but not slow enough as to be lagging too far behind. Seeing as there was no immediate danger to be had, the four could walk in relative peace as they trudged through the dirt and occasional muddy spot.

"Why wouldn't they?" Naruto asked. "They wanted to name their bridge something awesome, so who better than me?"

"I don't know," Sasuke responded. "They did have _me_."

"You're right, they did. I _wonder_ why you weren't picked?"

Sasuke snickered. "Same reason why I wasn't picked for Hokage: pity."

"Oh ha ha."

This banter continued well into the forest. It wasn't until they were upon the cusp of the village two days later that the boys stopped. By then, their arguing had grated on the other half of the team's nerves.

"I'm happy you can talk and all," Sakura said, rubbing her temple, "but do you really have to continue this nearly _as soon_ as you recover?"

"Yes," Naruto answered. Currently his fist was buried in Sasuke's cheek. To be fair, the raven haired boy's was also in his, so there was no love lost.

"I was asking Sasuke-kun, Naruto. Not you."

"As much as it pains me to say this, the idiot's right. I have to assert my superiority immediately or the class loser will get too full of himself." Sasuke's smirk was downright challenging, a point Naruto immediately picked up on.

"It's hard not to get full of me. There's just so much of me to go around!"

"There isn't," Sasuke replied. "Its just seems like it because of all that hot air you're spewing."

"Its hard not to be full of hot air when you keep trying to set me on fire!"

"Well, I'm sorry _whirlpool_ maybe you should learn some water ju-"

And as if it never stopped, their banter continued again. Sakura had to block her ears.

"Sensei?" Sakura asked. Her silver haired teacher had been doing a valiant effort in completely ignoring his three charges. Unearthing his head from his book, Kakashi looked over his pink haired student.

"Yes, pinkie?"

Sakura had been given that name some time ago. She had never endeared herself to it. She ignored it at first, hoping that it would fade with time. Evidently it had not, but she still held out hope. Taking a moment to calm herself, for she knew if she showed _any_ reaction whatsoever it would vindicate the silver haired man, she responded.

"Is there nothing you can do about this?" Sakura gestured to the two boys who had by now started to pull each other's hair and clothing. "They'll listen to you."

Kakashi spared a glance behind himself. Indeed, the two boys had reduced their shinobi training to biting and clawing at one another. Whatever suspicions he had about the blonde before wavered before the sheer natural feeling the two gave off. Rivalry and pure hearted distaste didn't run that deep without some sort of history. This being said, it only raised suspicions about Sasuke. The boy had been little more than a walking vegetable for about as long as the man had known him. Hiding that fact from his Hokage had been difficult, but it was also just something that he had grown used to. To have it changed, seemingly immediately, only pricked the Jonin's danger senses even more.

Kakashi wasn't a gambling man. He wouldn't bet anything if he wasn't sure he would win, and by that point it wasn't even strictly "betting" anymore. A very long time had passed since the man decided that he wouldn't ever bet against his danger sense, and he would surely look into the two more closely than before. Which reminded him...

"What?" Sakura asked. Kakashi had started staring at her, rather than the two problem children she had asked him to address. Looking over the girl with a critical eye, Kakashi sighed before turning back to his book.

"I can't be bothered to stop them. As the fairer sex of the team, I feel it should fall to _you_ to correct them of their ill behavior."

"What?" Sakura screeched. "That's sexist!"

"Maybe, but that's my excuse."

And thus, with a huff, Kakashi found his traveling partner stomping off behind him to break up the brawl. Seconds later, Kakashi almost winced at the sheer pressure of the hit that struck Naruto's head. Bemoaning the strike, Naruto was vocal in his displeasure.

"What the hell was that for?" Naruto yelled. "Sasuke was fighting too! Hit him!"

"I would, but he actually _listens_ when I talk to him. Unlike some people." Sakura was absolutely livid, but the hit still hurt Naruto more emotionally than physically. No, what really aggravated him was the smug smirk on Sasuke's face as he stared down Naruto behind Sakura's back.

Kakashi shook his head, before turning back to his book. Out of all of them, Sakura was the one student who _didn't_ give him a cause for alarm. Given her civilian background, it only made sense that she wasn't adept at hiding anything substantial. Her presence was both relaxing and efficient, as her annoyance kept him from having to break up the two fledgling shinobi.

Though her skill at doing so was also a cause for concern.

Kakashi shook his head once more as he buried himself ever deeper into his book. This was a successful mission. He would enjoy it while it lasted. He would leave the paranoia for when they were back in the village proper.

XxX

"The mountain looks so much better without your ugly mug on it," Sasuke stated. Both he and Naruto sat atop a water silo —the very same one that he and the blond destroyed, if he recalled. Dangling short legs and tired hearts, the two reborn children had finally managed to ditch their other two teammates. The sun was setting, painting the sky in a shady orange hue that was interrupted only by the fleeting clouds that dotted its canvas.

"I dunno what you're talking about. I almost forgot it was there." Naruto, unlike Sasuke, was lying down. Eyes closed and head resting on his folded hands, he was enjoying himself immensely. Not too far from where they lounged was a ramen shop, and the evening winds blew the smell of the noodles directly to where they sat.

"Of course you would. You had the misfortune of seeing it every day. I'm only ever in the village like, twice a year."

"Sometimes not even that," Naruto added. Sasuke nodded.

"I used to hate the work schedule you gave me. Ever since Sarada was born, I wanted to spend every waking second with her. Now I can see it for the blessing it is. If I had to see a giant version of your face every day, I'd probably defect again."

"Good luck with that," Naruto said. "I won't send Hunter Ninja after you, but I don't know how well you'd avoid your wife." Sasuke raised an eyebrow.

"Do you really think Sakura is strong enough to beat me?"

"In an all-out fight?" Naruto asked. "No. Definitely not. But you're too much of a softie to fight her all-out. As we both know, if you don't kill Sakura enough times, you're going to lose to her."

Sasuke scoffed. The action was so very _Uchiha_ it only made sense that he did it. "If Sakura knew that someone was holding back on her, she'd definitely smash them into paste. Limits or not though, I think I can still beat my wife."

Naruto laughed. It was deep, and hearty, and full of such wisdom that it was out of place on the goofy young blonde's face.

"Dude, I don't think you can beat your teammate _Genin_ Sakura, much less your wife, 'The Second Slug Sannin' Sakura. You just can't bring yourself to hurt her anymore."

"Excuse me? I take offense to that! I have the power of Gods and the embodiment of Hatred!" Sasuke put his hand over his heart, feigning pain. Naruto laughed at Sasuke's display.

"And yet somehow, you still lose to your wife. I saw you earlier, bastard. When Sakura asked you out on a dinner date, it took everything in you to refuse." Sasuke chuckled.

"Oh? Don't think you're off the hook, idiot. Kurama told me that you've been avoiding Hinata like the plague. What's that about?"

"Why am I not surprised the bastard fox is telling you everything?" Sasuke shrugged. "Whatever. I'll tell you the same thing I told him. I just haven't gotten around to talking to her yet."

"Bullshit." Sasuke pointed at his best friend, eyes daring him to contradict the statement. "You're still feeling guilty about her, aren't you?"

"I have no _idea_ what you're talking about."

"Yes you do."

"I haven't the slightest…"

"Naruto be serious."

"Fine," Naruto said, throwing his hands in the air as he relented. "I still feel a little bad. She loved me for so long, man. How can I face her, especially a child her, knowing how much I made her suffer and wait? It's unbelievable."

"At least you didn't try to shove a blade of lightning through her chest," Sasuke joked. Naruto laughed along.

"To be fair, she also tried to poison you."

"Have you tasted her cooking?" Sasuke asked. "She does that all the time."

"Oh? Is that the _real_ reason you're never home? Forget 'redeeming and repenting', you just wanted to get out of eating Sakura's terrible food!"

The two boys laughed uproariously at that. Reverted back to their childlike, undeveloped voices, the two sounded as if two raucous boys sharing an equally childish joke. Their laughter echoed and reverberated throughout the alleys and buildings which surrounded them. This was sure to disrupt those that lived among such abodes, but neither cared. Very rarely had they the time to laugh together, at least in their own time. They would enjoy the situation while they could.

Eventually the two managed to calm their spirits. Reverie dying down with their laughter, the two returned to a somber silence as the sun managed to nearly complete its descent beyond the horizon.

"Naruto," Sasuke began. His tone was low, a far cry from what he was not a minute ago. "Be honest. Will I see Sakura and Sarada again?" Naruto scoffed.

"You managed to avoid your wife and daughter for so long that by the time you finally saw either one again, you barely recognized them. What's so different now?"

"Before… What I mean…" Sasuke seemed to be stumbling over his own words. Sucking his teeth, Naruto hit the boy on his back.

"It's just me, asshole. My opinion of you couldn't be any lower than it is all the time. Just let it out." Sasuke didn't seem to appreciate the gesture, but relaxed at the words regardless.

"Fine. The difference is… before, back in our own time, even though I was gone for years, the option to come back was there. I _knew_ that I wouldn't be returning anytime soon. Somewhere, deep down in my heart, I still don't feel like I've repented enough to deserve holding the child of that wonderful woman."

"You pansy. I told you that they didn't care. No one cared. They just wanted their papa and husband back."

"Still," Sasuke continued, "I couldn't return. All the evil I've done and the lives I've ruined count towards something. You and I both know that even now, er, _then_. So many years after the Fourth Shinobi War, and people still had attempts on my life. So what that the big people in charge forgave me? All the common people, all the men and women that I killed, whether directly are indirectly, still had grieving families. Who am I to enjoy my family while they grieved their own?"

"It was _war_ Sasuke. You know what happens during war."

"Yes, I do. But more than all of that, I was a direct cause of it. Even if my part was small, it was still a part. Tell me, Naruto. Do you think that it's fair for me to sleep easy and happy after all the pain and suffering I've caused?"

"No," Naruto replied. Sasuke smiled. If there was anything about his best friend he enjoyed, it was his brutal honesty. "But that doesn't mean that you should beat yourself up over it forever. You've done plenty to make up for your wrongdoings. Twelve years of exile from your own family, something you've wanted for so long, don't you think that's a lot?"

Sasuke shook his head. Solemnly he stared at his own left arm, occasionally opening and closing the fingers on his hand. He was still not used to its extra weight quite yet, and moving with it was more off putting than anything else. Combined with the lower center of gravity and shorter reach, and overall everything was rather disorienting. This arm was both something he didn't want nor need, yet he was gifted with it anyway.

"It is. I've done a lot in the name of your service and your honor, Nanadaime Hokage. And yet, it still feels like it's not enough. It's never enough, and yet… I could do it forever, if I had to."

"Why?" Naruto asked. He had sat up.

"Because I know that I have a loving wife and a beautiful, powerful daughter at home." Sasuke lifted his left arm, using it to encircle the Hokage Mountain with his outstretched fingers. "I may not be able to reach them. No, I know I may never have had that ability, but the idea of knowing they were there was enough for me. I was protecting them, both in my mission and exile, and that was enough for me. Now, though… Now they're far away, in a place I can't even imagine. I feel cold and empty. Surely you feel it too?"

"I do," Naruto replied. "Knowing your family is in a place you can't go to leaves you empty inside. No amount of ramen can fill that void."

"So you understand?" Sasuke asked. "You know what I'm talking about?"

"Of course I do, bastard. I'm not that stupid."

"So answer my question. Will I see Sakura and Sarada again? Not this tiny Sakura, and not some other Sarada that might spring up in this timeline. Will the gods return me to see _my_ baby girl and _my_ beautiful wife? That's all I need to know."

And then there was silence. It seeped into the atmosphere like water into fabric, as it soaked the tension in the air to its very roots. After a bit longer, Naruto finally broke the staring contest the two were engaged in, before taking a deep breath.

"Yes, Sasuke. You will see them again. And I will see Hinata and my children as well. Believe it." At this, Sasuke chuckled. It was an Uchiha chuckle, borne of many generations of pride filled, ego maniacs who suppressed the urge to laugh.

"Somehow, your idiotic reassurance was all I needed."

"I hear my voice alone calmed the troops after the invasion."

"That wasn't an invasion, idiot." Sasuke laid down next to his blonde brother. "That was _your_ son who sabotaged all the village alarms."

"Yes, and it was _my_ voice that calmed everyone afterwards!"

"Of course it was! _You_ were the only one who could understand the mind of a prankster child like him!"

"You're just jealous because—"

Their banter continued well after the sun had finally set.

XxX

"So what's this about?" Sasuke asked. His left hand was fixed solely in his pocket as he and his two other teammates stood in front of their sensei. Naruto had convinced him that he couldn't simply cut his arm off and be done with it when they returned a week ago, so instead he settled to having it rest in his pocket. Eternally.

"I've nominated you three to the Chuunin Exams. Congratulations." The three students stared at their teacher. In one hand he held the book he had his head all but buried in. In the other, he held the three consent forms that belonged to them. The reason they knew it belonged to them was because their names were already signed on the signature lines.

"And what if we don't want to participate?" Sakura asked. She had her hand lifted, but was reluctant to retrieve the paper from her teacher. Their names were already there, in perfect replicas of their own signatures. Accepting the paper from him would be akin to accepting the situation he had all but forced them into.

"You don't have that option," Kakashi said. He hadn't removed his eyes from his book. The man looked like he couldn't possibly give any less attention to this situation if he tried.

"What are our options?" Naruto asked.

"Accepting."

"That's one choice. That's not an option then."

"I'm glad you understand."

"What if I make my own option?" Sasuke asked. "What if I burn those scrolls, solving our problem immediately?"

"I don't think you'll do that?" Kakashi hummed.

"And why not?" Sasuke's voice rose in challenge.

"Because you wouldn't want to burn yourself."

"What are you talking abo-" was about as far as Sasuke got before he realized that the papers were no longer in Kakashi's hand. Looking around, he saw that in Sakura's raised, but not outstretched, hand was the registration form with her name on it. Clearly as confused about the situation as her crush was, Sakura was reduced to only being able to stare at it in bewilderment.

"Okay, I'll bite, how the hell did he get this in my hair?" Naruto asked, fiddling with the rolled up registration form that was impaled by his unnaturally pointy hair. Resisting the urge to laugh and seeing the pattern, Sasuke looked all over himself, before finding his own form stuck in his back pocket.

Pulling it out, the raven haired teen thrust it as far from his body as possible. "I'm not participating in any little game of yours, Kakashi. If I don't want to be in the Exams, then I wo-"

It was around here that the students present realized their teacher was gone.

"What the… Naruto. Where the hell did he go?" Naruto shrugged.

"Hell if I know. Aren't you the one with the fancy eyes?"

"They weren't _on_ you blonde haired bonobo."

"That sounds like a problem for you."

Sasuke yelled a silent scream.

"I told you that we couldn't change anything," Naruto said. Finally pulling the paper from his hair, he unrolled the parchment to see that it, around the many holes from his hair, indeed had his signature perfectly scrawled. "This is rather impressive, actually."

"Tell me about it," Sakura answered amidst Sasuke's continued cries of rage. "I started practicing my professional signature maybe a month ago. To get it down this well when _I_ don't even have a full grasp of it is impressive."

"Well, I guess it _does_ make sense." Naruto stated. The Uchiha had taken to biting his shirt to contain his screams, not that the blonde cared in any way. "He is known as the Copy Ninja for a reason. I bet he only needed to see it once in order to predict how it would become."

"Wait, but I only ever practiced it alone. In my room. At night. How did he manage to see it?" Sakura asked. She was doing a level job of ignoring her crush's temper tantrum.

"Were your blinds open at any time?"

"They were not."

"Then I think that says more about our sensei than I needed to know," Naruto said, a creeped expression on his face. Upon noticing that his pink haired teammate did not share the sentiment, his eyebrow quirked. "Are you not worried about this in any way? The man could have been spying on you, in your room, and you don't even know how." Sakura quirked her eyebrow as well.

"Hmm? Oh. No, not at all, actually." The pinkette then turned back to her raven haired teammate. He had started to set the training ground on fire, and surprisingly the fires didn't immediately recede. The young medic-to-be did a stellar job of ignoring the Naruto clone with fox ears that suddenly appeared and started to help the young Uchiha.

"Why not?" Naruto asked. To be honest, he was too used to carnage and destruction to be affected by the relatively tame chaos that was erupting around him. Trees crackled under the now intense fire, but neither Genin regarded it with alarm.

"He's our Jonin sensei. He's pretty much _supposed_ to be spying on us." Naruto shook his head.

"No. I'm pretty sure he isn't."

"Oh come now, Naruto. It isn't _that_ bad."

"Sakura, I crawled into your tent one night by accident and you almost launched me into a river."

"I don't see your point."

"The nearest river was several miles away."

"Well, you _did_ invade my privacy," Sakura said.

"And Kakashi isn't?" Naruto all but screamed.

"It's not the same," Sakura responded.

"And how exactly isn't it?"

" _You_ don't have pictures of what I did with Sasuke while he was comatose."

For a while the clearing was enveloped in silence. Well, as silent as it could be considering two people were running around setting fire to everything in sight.

"You know that's blackmail… right Sakura?"

"Mhm," Sakura hummed, looking not the least bit interested in the conversation.

"I'm not sure it's legal to blackmail your students," Naruto knew for a _fact_ it was illegal to blackmail your students. Konohamaru came to him multiple times asking to do the very same in regards to Bolt. Naruto wanted desperately to allow him the right.

"We're ninja, Naruto. Concepts of 'right' and 'wrong' are lost on us."

"That sounds like something Kakashi would say."

"Hmm," Sakura hummed. She dodged a burning log that came soaring from the inferno that used to be a forest. Apparently the two had decided that burning down the Training Ground Forest wasn't enough anymore. They had to _beat_ it into submission now as well.

"You know you can do something about it. Complain to the Hokage?" Naruto fished for an idea. Sakura shook her head.

"I don't know where he keeps the pictures, Naruto. But he keeps them relatively close to my raven haired hunk." Naruto shuddered at the phrase. With a straight face, Sakura completely ignored her blonde teammate's reaction to her words, and calmly flipped to the second page of the registration form in her hand. Taking a small, square slip out, Sakura looked at it with distaste. "Even if I managed to get him apprehended for what he's doing, he would get the pictures to Sasuke before that. I couldn't bear to lose face in front of Sasuke, especially now that he's finally not in a coma anymore."

Naruto snuck a peak over his female teammate's shoulder. The image captured therein almost made him gag. It wasn't anything sexual, but it also wasn't something he'd ever thought he'd want to immediately forget. Its content was so mind-numbingly embarrassing that he felt sorry for all those participating in it.

The way Sakura seemed to now cradle the picture didn't help his disgust.

This being the case though, Naruto made it a personal mission to retrieve the photo at a later date. Such things were great blackmail material. With a chuckle, he realized he was planning on using the picture for the exact same reason his sensei did, though on different people. Turns out he learned something from his silver haired teacher after all.

"I'll play along with Kakashi-sensei's game for now, but as soon as his guard is down I'm reclaiming what's mine. And then, Sasuke-kun will finally be all for me, no strings attached."

Naruto was forced to chuckle at the dark vibes he was getting from the girl. It was sinister and foreboding, and honestly the thirty-six-year-old man was getting creeped out by it.

"If I didn't know any better, I would say that it was you, and not Kakashi, that took those photos you're so afraid of, and he just happened to get a hold of it."

Sakura's silence was not reassuring.

"Sa-Sakura?"

"Naruto," Sakura stated, her voice low, but somehow echoing over the sounds of carnage around them.

"You'll… play along… right?" Sakura asked. Naruto wasn't sure, but he could swear he could make out demonic figures dancing in the fire that surrounded them.

"P-Play along with what?" Naruto asked. His voice was shaky and cracked a little.

"Don't be dumb, Naruto. I _know_ you're smarter than you let others know." For the first time since their conversation started, Sakura turned to Naruto fully. Staring into her normally vibrant, green eyes, revealed only dead, dark orbs. Blank and distant, Sakura cupped her hands to her cheeks as a manic smile crept on her face.

"I'm so happy Sasuke-kun is back, and now that's he's back, and finally with me, I won't ever let him go. You won't do anything that would… take him away… would you?"

The tone she had used let him know that refusing was not an option.

"Good," Sakura stated, and instantly the aura of crazed death was gone. As soon as it disappeared, Sasuke had emerged from the slowly repairing treeline. He was sweating but otherwise calmed down.

"Hi you two. I'm fine now. Are we ready to take the Chuunin Exams?"

"Of course, Sasuke-kun!" Sakura beamed. Her smile was absolutely blinding, and judging by the barely repressed smile on the Uchiha's face, it was obvious that he thought so too. Sasuke basked in his future wife's amazing enthusiasm, before noticing that it was coming only from the one source. Turning to his other teammate, Sasuke scowled when he noticed Naruto's face was paler than a sheet of paper.

"What's wrong Naruto? I would've thought that _you_ of all people would be excited about this."

Naruto's answer was silence.

"Naruto? Are you alri-"

"Sasuke?" Naruto asked. Sasuke tilted his head.

"Yeah man? What's wrong? You look like someone just told you ramen was banned." Naruto shook his head.

"Remember that time we talked about certain habits of certain…" Naruto looked at Sakura. Her smile was happy. A little too happy. "Certain people in our lives?"

Sasuke nodded. He too looked at Sakura. Upon finding nothing wrong, he turned back to his friend. "Of course I do. What's that got to do with anyth-"

Naruto clasped his hand on his best friend's shoulder.

"You have absolutely _no_ idea."

And with that, Naruto slinked off, looking for all the world like he had seen everything wrong in the world and didn't know how to process it. Sasuke watched him go, confusion evident in his eyes before eventually Sakura latched onto his arm. The Uchiha's first instinct was to preen under the attention, but belied that thought as soon as it occurred. This wasn't his wife, the future top medic of the Shinobi World. This was just some lowly genin who quite honestly worshipped the ground he walked on. If he didn't know any better, he would even go on to say that his wife was a fangirl.

…

…

…

Oh Kami.

And instantly Sasuke's genius brain clicked. This in fact _wasn't_ his battle hardened princess who had spent years coming to terms with her obsession, and strengthening both herself and her career goals. This was a damaged, low self-esteemed girl who wanted to validate herself amongst her peers by using him as a prize.

She was unstable, she was crazy, but these were all things _his_ Sakura was as well.

No, this Sakura was someone he did not know, and the thought of how she handled his coma and the large amounts of withdrawal she was facing because of it became readily apparent. There, a glint in her beautiful viridian eyes revealed all he needed to know about what Naruto left him with.

This Sakura was only slightly insane, and it would take a while for him to revert her.

"Do you want to go on a date, Sasuke-kun?" his pink haired angel asked. Her tone told him that refusal was not an answer.

"Good," Sakura stated, and just like that she dragged him off through town, most likely to some restaurant.

There was laughter. There was laughter somewhere in the village. It was faint, but following the Uchiha. The boy wasn't sure whether the mirth originated from Naruto or the gods themselves for putting him in this situation, but Sasuke decided he didn't care.

He would get back at the _both_ of them for their transgressions. There would be no alternative.


	12. Chapter 12: Interlude to the Exams

_**Hey guys! Sorry about the late submission! I found a job recently, and that with school is eating up some time. I'll do shoutouts again next chapter, whenever that comes out. Thank you for the encouragement and the reviews, and thank you for the support. Everyone who favorites and follows, I thank you.**_

* * *

Hiruzen steepled his hands. With his chin resting on them, he eyed the person in front of him with stern, critical eyes. Said person stared back, his both energetic and sparkling eyes coming close to disarming the aged Hokage. Shaking the feeling, the Third addressed his visitor with only a little confusion.

"So what brings you here today, Naruto?" the man known as "The Professor" asked. With a bright, alluring smile, the Genin responded.

"Is it too much to ask that I spend some time with my favorite grandfather figure?" Naruto asked. Hiruzen frowned. The only time Naruto ever referred to him as such was when he wanted something. Thinking over the events that happened in the blonde's life recently, the old man attempted to figure out what such a thing could be, so he could accurately refuse him it. If there was anything Hiruzen learned over the years, it was that when an Uzumaki wanted something, it was usually not good.

"You cannot have a free ramen coupon," Hiruzen calmly stated. When Naruto simply shook his head, Hiruzen cursed, though inwardly.

"I don't want that, Gramps. I know you can't do it anyway." Indeed, upon becoming Hokage, he tried to force Ichiraku's —which was now run by the owner's daughter, Ayame— to give him free ramen for life. Mountain destroying power or not, he was not able to survive the ladle whacking she gave him that day.

Hiruzen quirked an eyebrow at Naruto's revelation. That was a… surprisingly coherent thought. Perhaps his latest mission had opened possibilities for the young man? Speaking of which…

"You will not get another C-class mission, especially after the disaster of your last one. You seem to attract danger, and I do not need anything else so perilous to befall you."

Naruto laughed at the old man's declaration. "I don't think I'll be going on any missions anytime soon. The Chuunin Exams are right around the corner!"

Hiruzen felt a bead of sweat trill down his brow. The man had _administered_ the event and completely forgot about it in the face of the blonde child. Picking up a random piece of paper from his desk, Hiruzen pretended to read it and come to a startling revelation.

"Hmm, oh. Ah, yes. Kakashi nominated you three and you accepted?"

"Of course!" Naruto chirped. The exam papers were still in his back pocket.

"Hmm, yes. I see. Well, good to know." Hiruzen then proceeded to light his pipe in an attempt to save face. Naruto decided to let him do so.

"Well, if you're not here for any of those reasons…" Hiruzen started, now content with chugging on his pipe. "Then why _are_ you here?"

"What if I really did want to just spend some time with you?" Naruto asked. Hiruzen found the idea laughable.

"Because that's not who you are, Naruto," Hiruzen responded. He then stopped, took a few drags on his pipe and pondered something. Turning back to his young charge, he frowned. "You cannot learn a new jutsu from the Forbidden Scroll."

Naruto laughed. "Did you keep it in the same place?"

"Well, no." Hiruzen admitted, not at all flustered at revealing top secret information to what could possibly be the _worst_ person in the village to reveal it to.

"Then I don't think I would have found it anyway, haha. The Shadow Clone Technique alone was enough to bore me half to death." Hiruzen nodded. He was surprised Naruto was able to sit still long enough to learn anything from it at all.

"So… why are you here?" Hiruzen asked for the third time that day.

"I just wanted to spend some time with you."

"I find that exceedingly hard to believe," Hiruzen responded. Naruto scratched his head.

"Why can't I do something _without_ some ulterior motive?"

"I don't know, why _can't_ you?" Hiruzen threw the question back in his face. Frowning, it took all of Naruto's will to not fly into a tangent.

"I haven't _always_ been devious."

"One time you pretended to be devastated by the mistreatment of the villagers towards you in order to get close enough to me to steal my hat."

"To be fair, I actually was devastated. Just not enough to warrant _not_ stealing your hat."

"One time you pretended to be interested in the ANBU task force enough for me to tell you where the paint we use to color their masks was manufactured." Hiruzen continued.

"That one wasn't even that bad!"

"Their masks were hot pink for a week, Naruto."

"So?"

"It's a matter of national security, Naruto! I couldn't use _any_ of the new operatives after that! Do you realize how much money you cost the Village for that stunt alone?"

"No," Naruto admitted. He looked a little sheepish. "But I do know the ANBU chased me for several days after that."

"That they couldn't catch you shames me to this day."

"That's only two times," Naruto said. Hiruzen smiled.

"Do you realize we have an entire archive dedicated to you? Rows upon rows of files dedicated solely to documenting your exploits have been arranged for the sole purpose of validating this exact moment."

With a snap, hundreds of thick manila envelopes appeared in the Third Hokage's office.

"Do you wish for me to go over each one?"

Naruto shook his head violently. With another snap the documents were gone.

" **Where… where was that hidden in the future? I know you've snapped in the office before. That had never happened.** "

"Kyuubi I just… I just don't know."

"So as you can see," Hiruzen said, quite unknowing of the conversation in Naruto's head, "you lean more towards ulterior motives than not. The only real question is what _exactly_ it is that you're vying for."

"Maybe, this one time, I'm actually just here to see you." Naruto said. Hiruzen chuckled.

"Oh? Is that so?"

"Yeah, it is so!" Naruto yelled, slightly upset that he was being doubted.

"And what brought on this desire?" Hiruzen decided to humor the child.

"I dunno," Naruto admitted. "You never know when you might lose something. You're the only person who really cared for me for such a long time. You've been there for me since… before I can even remember really. Maybe… I dunno. Maybe I wanted to talk to you a bit? Outside of necessity or punishment?"

Hiruzen's eyes softened at the blonde's declaration. For a moment his aged visage seemed to catch up to him as the old man contemplated the words of the youth before him. For a brief moment, the desire to reach out and embrace the young man before him —the same of which he had raised from just a wee babe— almost overcame him. That moment however, was aptly brief. Recognition sparked in the aged and wizened man's eyes, and a gentle smile beseeched his face.

"This is a distraction, isn't it?" Hiruzen asked.

"Oh yeah."

And just like that an explosion sounded out somewhere near the tower. Jolting to his feet, Hiruzen rushed to his window to see multicolored particles of dust raining down in front of him.

"Is that… paint?" Hiruzen asked, only half wondering where the boy could get such an amount. The other half was completely unsurprised, because Naruto had a penchant for doing something that made no sense, so trying to apply such a concept to him was ineffectual. That being said, seeing as to where the paint and chalk dust was falling, Hiruzen had no illusions as to what was hit just now.

"Really, Naruto? The monument _again_?" Hiruzen asked, whirling on the spot. By the time he had turned, however, the boy was already gone.

"Oh, phooey," the ancient leader huffed. There was no use sending the ANBU to capture the Genin. The bot had already proven that he had no trouble evading the force for long. Naruto would turn up eventually, all Hiruzen would have to do was wait. Turning with the patience of a true commander, there was only one thought that rested in his mind.

"I wonder what he did with it this time?"

Meanwhile, very far away, Naruto sat on a branch of a very tall tree that overlooked the village. The dust from the launched paintballs still covered the mountain, so the fruits of his labor was still yet to be seen. That being said, Naruto still basked in the glow of his handiwork. The handiwork, of course, not being the graffiti he had wrought.

" **You think the Old Man caught on to the fact you really** _ **were**_ **just there to see him**?" Kyuubi asked while manifesting to sit on the tree next to his host. Naruto shook his head, before leaning against the trunk of the tree.

"Time hasn't reset, has it?"

" **How do you feel? Are you content with the time you've had with him? Once the exams start you won't get another chance**."

"I'm fine, Kurama. The Old Man had been dead for far too long already. I can handle him going again. He had lived and died in peace, and with a resounding smile on his face as I've been told. I have no regrets." The site then fell into silence as the two watched as the smoke settled.

"Besides, I don't think I could come up with another prank as grand as this. Disguising my visit as a distraction was the only way I could talk to him."

" **Indeed** ," the Kyuubi chuckled.

The evening sun shone its orange rays over the village. In the setting sun one could just clearly make out the myriad of colors that decorated the Four Hokages' faces. Saturated with chakra, the paint shone in different colors depending on where you looked at it, overall lending to a dazzling, if not disrespectful, scenery.

Out of all of this though, one thing could be made immediately discernable. Of all the Fire Shadows, only the Third's face was left unmarred.

Naruto smiled. "I'll miss you Gramps. Thank you for everything."

XxX

Sasuke smirked when he saw the hysteria Naruto wrought upon the town with his newest prank. The Uchiha would never say it out loud, but he missed the kind of heavy handed sophistication that Naruto's pranks held. His son and heir, precocious brat as he was, was also a talent when it came to the art of mischief that his father pioneered. He however didn't, for all his talent, have his father's class when it came down to it though.

On cue, a zealous ninja attempted to get to work cleaning the mountain. The goop immediately responded to the chakra source and swallowed him whole. After a few seconds the poor man was spit back out, appropriately doused in multicolored paint.

Oh yes. He would praise the blonde for his ingenuity. They wouldn't be getting the monument clean until they finally caught the man. On a side note, Naruto's grades in stealth and reconnaissance was still unmatched even to this day in the future. It was truly a shame that the man preferred straight up combat.

"Sasuke-kun?" a voice rang out, and instantly Sasuke could feel a shiver run up his spine. Retreating into the shadows of the leaves of the tree whose branch he sat in, Sasuke held his breath as he waited for his pink haired teammate to pass. She did so without incident, and Sasuke was abruptly reminded of _his_ mission for the day.

"Let's see if I can't put Naruto's record to shame," the Uchiha mused, before disappearing into thin air.

Sakura had a penchant for finding him. He didn't know how, but she would always know his general location. Now it was just a matter of how long it took her.

XxX

Sakura roamed the village, her green eyes scanning over everything she could set her sights on. Buildings, alleyways, even behind aisles of stores, Sakura looked everywhere for any sight of her raven haired teammate. In her gut she could feel that her love was somewhere in her general vicinity, but always he would disappear right as she was about to get a lock on him.

Simply put, it annoyed her to no end. Sasuke would always be just within her reach, but immediately, like the wind, he would vanish. The frustration she felt consumed her every thought, and as such the pinkette didn't notice the 3-foot-tall child.

Somehow only Sakura fell down from their collision. Rubbing her butt, she looked up to see a small child clad in a scarf that was several sizes too big for him. After a few seconds he was flanked by two other equally tiny children, one male and one female. The girl had outrageously styled hair that seemed to regard gravity as a suggestion more than a rule. The boy had the exact opposite problem. The way his nose was running seemed to suggest a particularly deep grudge with the planet-wide force.

"Konohamaru, are you okay?" the girl asked as she reached him. Her voice was high pitched and she was missing a tooth, but considering her age that was fine.

"Yeah, we heard someone crash!" the other child said. His snot hung from his nose like a pendulum, and Sakura had to wonder how he managed to talk around it.

Or why he didn't just wipe his nose.

"I'm fine Moegi, Udon!" the kid in the lead announced. "It'll take more than some _girl_ to keep me down!"

Sakura was incensed by the boy's comment. She rose to hit him, and for a moment the boy seemed startled by her actions. Just as she was about to hit him, however, a hand grabbed her wrist. Turning with righteous fury, Sakura prepared to whack whoever stopped her as well, only for her anger to be immediately disarmed by a legendary smile.

"Cha doin', Sakura?" Naruto asked. His smile put the sun to shame.

"N-nothing, Naruto." Sakura responded. For some reason Naruto gave off this aura that told her dissidence was a fairly unhealthy course of action.

"Oh," Naruto responded, his smile not faltering in the least. "Cause it'd be troublesome if you hit the Hokage's grandson, especially so close to the Chuunin Exams!"

Sakura's face paled. "He's…" She then turned to the boy she was about to assault, whose impetuous face was completed by tiny folded arms. "You're the Sandaime's grandson?"

"Well… yeah!" Konohamaru responded. "Yeah, I am! And more importantly…" Konohamaru pointed to the blonde ninja who had saved him. "What's it to you, Brother Naruto? I thought you knew how I felt about being treated specially?" Konohomaru's tone sounded almost hurt. Naruto chuckled at it.

"Well, I can't help but treat you specially, because after all, you _are_ special to me." Naruto then made his way over to the child and ruffled his hair. "But not for being the Hokage's grandson."

Konohamaru's eyes lit up. "Really? Then why?"

"Well, that's obvious, isn't it?" Naruto asked. Konohamaru shook his head vehemently. His eyes were sparkling as he looked up to his idol.

"No! It isn't! Tell me, Brother Naruto!"

"Well, if you _really_ want to know…"

"Yes, we want to know Brother Naruto!" Moegi piped up.

"Yes, tell us!" Udon assented. At some point he had pulled out a handkerchief to clean his glasses, but not his nose. His nose was left oddly untouched.

"Fine, but only because you three asked me. Are you ready?"

"Yes!" the three children chanted as one. Their excitement was hard to ignore.

"Well, the reason Konohamaru is so special…"

The three children leaned forward as one, wanting to be as close to Naruto as possible, as if the action would let them know sooner.

"Is…"

"Yes?" the three asked. They were near bursting with anticipation, and thus leaned forward even further. This brought a grin to Naruto's face.

"Because…"

"Yes?" the kids all but screeched.

"He lets me know where you guys are, so I can use you all as punching bags!" And just like that, Naruto had bopped all three children on the head. As one they fell to the ground, both from the hit and the shock of being duped, and even Sakura lost her balance a bit.

After a bit Sakura recovered. "Naruto!"

"Hmm?" Naruto asked, turning around. "Something wrong, Sakura?"

"What was that for?"

"Fun?" Naruto answered, bewildered at her confusion. "If they couldn't dodge that, it was their own fault. I was going _really_ slow."

Sakura shook her head. She brought her hand up to her forehead to massage there. "You can't just hit civilians like that." Sakura then gestured to Konohamaru. "Especially the Hokage's grandson!"

"Hey!" said grandson shouted. He was indignant, and his posture reflected that. "I'll have you know that I'm a _ninja-in-training_ too! One day, I'm going to be the Hokage, believe it!"

Sakura winced at another person repeating Naruto's catchphrase. She turned to her blonde friend. "You've been teaching him."

"Is it that obvious?" Naruto asked.

Sakura looked back at the trio of kids. The other two who stood behind the Hokage's grandson had remained quiet, simply letting Konohamaru do the talking. It was clear who the leader of the group was, but despite this, the look in their eyes as they stared down Naruto was evident. They all but _glowed_ with admiration for the young man, and even Konohamaru, albeit grudgingly, showed the same reverence.

"A little," Sakura replied. It was wholly obvious, but she decided to be tactful.

"Big Brother Naruto has been teaching us lots!" the girl known as Moegi chimed. Her smile was wide and innocent. So innocent, in fact, that Sakura wondered whether she had that naiveté when she was the girl's age.

"Yeah," Udon said around sniffles. "Though he mostly just hits us."

"Mostly just hits you, eh?" Naruto asked, one golden eyebrow raising in challenge. "Should I train you some more? How about right now?"

"N-no, that's not necessary Big Bro!" Konohamaru said, his voice in a whisper. Slowly he backed away from the older boy. "We're still recovering from our last beatdown!" Konohamaru then caught himself. "I mean, training! We're still recovering from our last training session!"

"Oh, no! I couldn't _possibly_ deprive such young, _willing_ minds from the wonders of my instruction!"

Sakura could hear the malice in Naruto's voice. So palpable was it that Sakura couldn't help but feel pity for the brats she felt hostility towards not three minutes ago.

"So kiddies, are you ready?" Naruto asked. He stalked towards them with an unbecoming smile on his face. The three children were visibly shaking now, and it wasn't long before their base instincts took over and they chose preservation. As one, the trio took off, kicking up a dust cloud behind them as they escaped. Cackling, the blonde Genin chased them, though at a more sedated pace.

Sakura stared at them from behind. Standing still, Sakura attempted to make sense of what she just witnessed. It was a relatively simple concept, but she refused to wrap her head around it.

"I don't want to go check on them," Sakura stated. "I don't _have_ to go check on them."

Her Sasuke senses tingled. It was in the general direction of where her compatriots just ran.

"I feel like I don't have a choice in the matter of whether I go check on them."

No, she didn't.

XxX

Naruto was only a little surprised when he came across his student being held in the air by a familiar, if not younger, hand. Konohamaru was suspended above the ground by the collar. Smirking at the child he had in his grip, Kankuro of the Sands was downright _pleased_.

"Leave him alone," Temari of the Sands, Kankuro's sister, stated from behind him. Her blonde hair was done up in two wild ponytails that looked rather silly now that Naruto thought about it.

" **You all looked silly back then. Every single one of you. Especially Rock Lee** ," Kurama chimed.

"Lee hasn't changed," Naruto thought back.

" **And neither have most of you.** "

"I will!" Kankuro responded to his sister. The look on his face implied that he would do no such thing. "But not before I teach him a little lesson first!"

Kankuro then turned his attention back to Konohamaru. The boy whimpered, and Kankuro felt a perverse pleasure in his fear. Raising a fist, the man attempted to hit the boy, when something small and hard hit the back of his hand. Wincing at the pain, the Sand ninja turned his head to where he presumed the projectile came, only for another to hit him on the nose.

"Ouch! What the fu-" another projectile hit him, this time on the teeth. Aptly silenced now, all Kankuro could do was groan when another object hit his other hand. The pain made him release his captive, who quickly ran to hide behind Naruto.

"Brother Naruto," Konohamaru whimpered. Naruto placed a hand on the boy's head.

"Its fine, Konohamaru. The scary clown won't hurt you anymore."

"Wh-who are you calling a clown?" Kankuro muttered around the pain. "If I were you, I'd keep my mouth shut before, gah!" Kankuro screamed. The projectiles returned, this time hitting him in the eyes. "Who the hell keeps throwing those?"

"You're early, Sasuke." Naruto's attention was turned upwards toward a tree that was slightly behind the Sand siblings. In its branches sat the lone Uchiha, a smile on his face as he juggled rocks in his right hand.

"I didn't have a choice whether or not I was here. I might as well have fun." Stating this, Sasuke tossed another rock at Kankuro. It hit him in the back of his head, and a follow up one to his knee made him collapse. "I thought he'd start to dodge these. Is it just me or is everyone moving impossibly slow?"

"No, it's not," Naruto responded. "Don't forget that you're used to fighting people who move at near light speed. These are just children."

Temari looked the blonde boy up and down. He was short, and looked even younger than herself.

"Who are you to call other people children?" the blonde Sand ninja asked. Naruto quirked an eye at her.

"Who are you to let your brother keep getting hit by rocks?" As he asked her, another rock hit Kankuro, this time on the cheek. The boy was cursing profusely.

"I'm his sister."

"Yes?"

"I _like_ seeing him get hurt."

"Is that so? Should I also take the same approach?" A voice —low, monotone and dead— somehow filled the area. Obscene amounts of killing intent bathed the area, and everyone, including Sakura who had just arrived, were forced to their knees.

Everyone except Naruto and Sakura, of course. They had barely registered the threat.

Temari felt as if she had been paralyzed. Her entire body went stiff as her spine went ramrod straight. "Gaara. I didn't know you were around here."

"No one ever does," Gaara mumbled. He was using chakra to stand upside down on the branch Sasuke was sitting on.

" **Okay, we were just looking up there at the Uchiha boy. I** _ **know**_ **he wasn't up there**." Kyuubi barked.

"Maybe he really _is_ that good." Naruto responded.

" **Bullshit! Did you see him?** "

"I had a general feeling of where he was."

" **I can sense Shukaku! There's no way he could have been hiding from me!** "

"Maybe you weren't trying?"

" **Bite me**."

"Later," Naruto responded, before turning his attention outward. Sasuke was just staring bewildered at the boy beneath him, his facial expression showing that he too was surprised by the boy's entrance.

"Okay, I _know_ you weren't there a couple seconds ago."

Gaara looked up at the raven haired boy who had addressed him. He looked slightly less disinterested when he did so.

"You have… the same eyes as me."

"Not this again," Sasuke growled. He threw another rock at Kankuro. Interestingly enough, neither Sand sibling moved to defend the boy, even though Sasuke knew full well that Gaara could have. "If you want someone with the same eyes, look at that ball of sunshine over there."

Sasuke pointed to Naruto, whose eyes literally shone upon being indicated. Gaara tried to look at him, he really did, but gave up the endeavor shortly after beginning.

"He is nothing like me," Gaara mumbled.

"Trust me," Sasuke responded. "He is more like you than you could ever possibly imagine."

"I think I have empathized with literally everyone I have ever met. It has been… Interesting." Naruto stated.

"Whatever," Gaara said. He then disappeared in a burst of sand, shortly reappearing on the ground in front of his siblings. Temari stiffened even more upon his arrival, and outright froze when he turned to them.

"Come, we are leaving. Stay behind and I will kill you." Gaara said such words with the air of someone talking about the weather. Brushing past his sister as if she were no more than a hindrance, the One Tailed Jinchuuriki set a slow pace away from the site. Temari rushed to keep up, but turned a sympathetic eye to her other brother, who was still on the ground.

"Kankuro, come on!" Temari urged. Her voice was in a slight whisper.

"Oh, I'm _so sorry_. Maybe I'd be in a better position to follow if _someone didn't keep throwing rocks at me_."

"I thought you'd start dodging by now," Sasuke stated from the tree. He threw another rock, this one hitting the boy in the back.

"Damn it! Stop that!"

"Why? It's fun."

"Temari!" Kankuro shouted.

"Yes?"

"Help!?"

"Oh, right." Temari then pulled her fan over her shoulder. Opening it to its first moon, the Sand sister attempted to shield her brother with it. Little did she know that Sasuke was a master of rock throwing. The next rock the Uchiha threw arced in an impossible crescent around the fan and hit the boy in his other eye.

"TEMARI," Kankuro screamed.

"What?"

"IT ISN'T WORKING."

"I can see that!" Temari shouted back. She then turned back to the boy in the tree. "Don't you have anything else better to do? What you're doing can literally end up killing us."

Sasuke shrugged. "Less competition in the exams."

Around here the killing intent, which had vanished with Gaara's departure, had returned with the redhead's arrival.

"Didn't I say to keep up?" the redhead mumbled. Sand started to pour out of the kid's gourd, which was on the boy's back. Kankuro, who was appropriately annoyed at the whole situation, had decided to stop caring whether or not he died.

"Can you _not_ see the situation I'm in?"

"He is just throwing rocks at you. Dodge."

"Easy for you to say. _You_ don't have to dodge!"

"I have never needed to," Gaara responded.

"Then don't get on me for not being able to dodge all these rocks he's throwing! He's throwing them really fast!"

Another rock hit Kankuro, this time in his neck.

"Where are you getting all of these rocks?" Kankuro cried.

"You know," Sasuke started. "I really don't know. I didn't count the rocks as I picked them up, but I _know_ I didn't pick up this many."

"Oh _joy_." Kankuro stated. His voice dripped in sarcasm. He turned to his brother, pleading with his eyes. "Can you _help me please_ Gaara? You're my brother!"

"And?" Gaara tilted his head.

"I know you don't understand relationships, so I'll spell it out for you. Family helps each other out, so _help me_."

Gaara turned his head to Temari. "But this one said that one should like it when their brother was in pain."

Temari felt a bit of pride through the soul crushing fear she had for her sociopathic little brother.

"That's because she's _insane_."

"So am I," Gaara responded. Kankuro rolled his eyes.

"You're not insane, you're misguided. Please help me?" Another rock hit Kankuro. It was in his ankle this time. As he was trying once again to stand up, this was an especially annoying place to hit.

Gaara quirked a, for some reason, black eyebrow. "I am… misguided?"

"Yes, very."

"Mother says I am not."

"Our mother died, Gaara. That you think she's talking to you is exactly what makes you misguided."

"Mother says I should kill you."

"Did you not hear what I just said?"

"I'm signing off from this conversation," Naruto said. In a whirl of leaves both he and Konohamaru vanished.

"Me too," Sasuke said. In a shimmer of light, he too vanished.

"Wait, what?" Sakura asked. She had been forgotten by the side during the conversation. "Since when have you two known how to teleport?" Realization then dawned on her. "And wait… that was Sasuke!"

The pink haired girl then turned to go chase after where she thought the two had disappeared to, only to be grabbed by the scruff of her neck by a hand of sand.

"Worry not, small child. I will not kill you if you answer my questions. Do you think I am misguided for thinking my dead mother is talking to me?"

Sakura stared at Gaara and his words. Unsure of what to say to the psychopath, she let out a short whimper.

"Why me?" she asked herself. Somewhere in the back of her head she realized this was the _second_ time she was stuck in a conversation with a psychopathic murderer.


	13. Chapter 13: Start the Exams

_**Sorry guys! It's finals week and I've been backlogged with everything and projects and work and projects and WORK AND PROJECTS AND WORK.**_

 _ **In order to calm myself I'd taken to sleeping and reading. Sorry. I'd do this full time if I could, but it doesn't pay the bills.**_

* * *

"Damn it!" Sasuke yelled as he was battered into the ground for the third time in one minute. Looking on as a bystander, Naruto could barely repress his giggles.

"You should know better than to fight Bushy Brows in hand-to-hand combat," Naruto said. His smile couldn't have possibly been any wider.

"He's _younger_ than me! This shouldn't be happening!" Sasuke yelled back. A short distance away Rock Lee, a steadfast young man with the most ridiculous eyebrows you could ever see, landed with nary a sound. An inward facing palm held out in front, and a closed fist bent behind his back, the teen looked ready to continue his spar if need be.

Naruto tilted his head. "Well, technically, it _should_ be. This is what happened last time."

Sasuke, who was picking himself up off the ground, looked at his best friend in utter disbelief. "The gods can force this too?"

"They made me fail a test," Naruto stated simply.

" **That isn't a good example** ," Kyuubi said from inside the seal. " **We don't know that you couldn't have failed that test all by yourself**."

"Wasn't I supposed to bite you?" Naruto asked. Kyuubi snickered.

Sasuke wasn't feeling so jolly. "This is stupid! I have the Mangekyo Sharingan! How is he outpacing me?"

"Couldn't Bushy Brows do that in the future, too?" Naruto asked. Sasuke blanched.

"Well, yes. But this isn't the future, and this isn't future Lee. _Future_ Lee sweat blood and _tears_ for many, _many_ years in order to get the kind of speed and power he did. This Lee is only starting to get that kind of dedication."

Naruto nodded. "I see your point."

"Besides, even future Lee couldn't completely outrun my eyes. That this younger version can is ridiculous."

" **Anything is possible with godlike intervention**."

"Well screw that and screw you," Sasuke screamed. Turning over, the Uchiha stared down his green spandex wearing opponent and did what an Uchiha usually did when they caught sight of someone.

Be a total and complete dick.

All at once Lee's leotard caught on black, unholy fire. The flames flared and grew, until Lee was covered in them like an armor.

"Haha! Take _that_ gods! What do you have to say about that?" Sasuke asked, yelling his question as a challenge to the powers that be. Apparently they took it, because Lee stood where he was, completely nonplussed.

"Your flames are nothing compared to the white hot intensity of my Fires of YOUTH!" And just like that, with sheer willpower alone, Lee shunted the flames away.

"But… wait… what?" Sasuke babbled. His mind was on complete shutdown.

"Did Bushy Brows just shrug off Amaterasu?" Naruto asked, clearly as surprised as his onyx haired counterpart.

" **It appears so** ," Kyuubi responded. " **About time your constant pissing in the wind came back around**."

"Are you quite done, Mr. Uchiha? You will need more than pretty flames if you want to challenge _me_." Lee then pumped his chest with his fist. "It also helps that my youthful attire is completely resistant to all matters of fire!"

"That's… impossible! That's hacks! The gods can't give you that!"

Lee chuckled. "As much as I would like to say it was a gift from the gods, my outfit was formatted and developed by none other than Guy-sensei himself! Forged from his sweat and… other… bodily secretions, which I hope was his blood and tears, this suit cannot be marred by any source of the elements!"

"That makes too much sense," Naruto said, nodding from the sidelines. "I cannot remember either Lee or Guy ever having so much as a loose string on their leotards. Why hadn't I noticed until now?"

" **Because you, like everyone else, tried your hardest to focus on anything** _ **but**_ **the leotards.** "

"I try to focus on the leg weights," Naruto said. "They are a fascinating color of orange."

" **I pay attention to the eyebrows. In all my years I have never seen anything so unnatural**."

"We've seen people who are literally immortal."

" **I can make more sense of that.** "

Back with Sasuke, the man/boy was having a tough time hitting the actual boy. Throwing everything short of the Susanoo, Sasuke found that absolutely nothing hit.

"Why won't you go down?" Sasuke asked while in the middle of a Great Fireball Technique. The bushy browed boy just laughed, before dodging the fireball as if it were a simple rock, and not a gigantic, room encompassing mini sun.

"Nothing can douse my _Fires of Youth_."

"Bullshit!" Sasuke screamed, and once again doubled his efforts.

" **I don't think Sasuke is taking this whole, 'you can't change anything' deal too well**." The Kyuubi sounded much less concerned about things than he should have been.

"Really? What gave it away?" Naruto asked.

" **The fact that he is still, after several retries, trying to beat Rock Lee even though we told him that he was supposed to lose**."

Naruto stared off into open space. As Kyuubi was in his seal, the fox had no reason to believe that his host was meaning to stare at him. Somehow, in some way though, he did. " **What**?"

"I don't think you catch on to when I'm being sarcastic."

" **Oh,** " Kyuubi said, before donning a smile. Again, there was no way that Naruto should be able to tell this, but he did. " **I get your sarcasm just fine; I just don't respond to it**."

"You're a prick Kurama."

" **At least I'm not your teammate**."

It was around here that Sasuke found his face firmly planted in the ground once more. Using wobbly arms, the father and beloved husband gingerly pushed himself upright from his beating by the fourteen-year-old boy.

"This… isn't… over…" Sasuke said through gritted teeth. Lee found that he didn't agree.

"I'm afraid that it is, Mr. Uchiha! I have proven that my hard work and Flames of Youth can overcome your genius and bloodline limit, and I am overjoyed!"

"No!" Sasuke screamed. "We're not… ending this… here!"

"Truly," Lee continued. "I have proven not only the superiority of Guy-sensei's teachings above Kakashi-sensei's—"

" **To be fair, his teacher's 'teachings' amounted to 'here's the thing, do it'**."

"—and proven once and for all that green spandex trumps the Sharingan!"

Sasuke could feel the vein on his forehead come close to bursting. "This… not… done yet!"

"And finally…" Lee started. Kyuubi perked up from where he was lounging in Naruto.

" **Naruto** ," Kyuubi stated.

"What?" Naruto asked. He was interested by the goings-on of the scene before him. Namely Sasuke getting beaten. In the future the only person who could do that was him.

" **I want, no,** _ **need**_ **you to listen to me for once in… ever.** "

Naruto raised an eyebrow. "Now this is a curious request. What brought this on?"

" **I can feel something coming. I don't like it. We need to get out of here**."

"Please," Naruto scoffed at the idea. "What could possibly happen that could threaten _us_?"

" **I don't know, but I don't want to find out**."

"… finally, I get to prove to Sakura-chan…" Lee continued.

"Oh," Naruto responded. " _That_ might be bad."

"That she…"

The vein on Sasuke's head grew larger, despite the fact it should have burst long ago. To Naruto, who could sense chakra and intent, Sasuke was a roiling mass of unstable chakra and emotions. This of course was nothing new. What was wrong with the situation was that the emotions involved this time were mostly anger.

"…belongs…"

" **Brat** ," Kurama growled.

"Hmm?"

" **Take the girl and go!** "

"Oh right!" And just like that Naruto grabbed Sakura and disappeared. A shimmer and a few fallen leaves were all that remained to mark their departure.

"…to me!" Lee finished.

XxX

Naruto laughed hysterically on the floor of the time voided past. Tears streaming down his whiskered cheeks, the ex-Hokage could barely breathe.

"For the first time, ever, it _isn't_ my fault that time broke!" the blonde yelled. Sasuke had the decency to appear embarrassed. At least, as embarrassed as an Uchiha could appear. In truth Sasuke still looked prideful, but at least less so than normal.

"It isn't my fault."

"It's entirely your fault," Neji said. He stood across from them in the town's square. Since this was where Naruto fled to when Sasuke more or less exploded, this was where their meeting was to be held apparently. "You turned into a Perfect Susanoo and chased Lee for three hours. I would say this is pretty much _entirely_ your fault."

" **I'm just surprised that the powers-that-be allowed that rampage to last for so long,** " Kyuubi said. He was sitting in a chair he had stolen from a nearby shop. It'd be returned later.

Naruto had a witty follow up to that, but he was currently indisposed. Every time his laughter would calm down to a low giggle he would, upon remembering what happened, immediately break into laughter again. It had taken about half an hour for the world to reset so far, and the entire time Naruto had been laughing in this not breaking cycle.

Sasuke was not amused. "You could stop now, you know." Naruto's answer was even more raucous laughter. Kyuubi had to answer for him.

" **He means that he can't. He actually, physically, can't.** "

Neji raised an eyebrow. "You could understand that?"

" **No, but his thoughts are still available to me**."

"He's communicating telepathically to you?"

" **No** ," Kyuubi answered once more. " **In his head he's laughing just as heard. It's just that I could deduce from both looking at him and hearing his thoughts that he can't hold back his laughter**."

Neji turned to Sasuke. "This is the man you chose to lead the village." Sasuke shrugged.

" _I_ didn't choose anything. If it were up to me, I'd sooner put Kiba of all people in charge, just so the idiot wouldn't get a big ego. No, it was _Kakashi_ who nominated Naruto, and at that point there was really no other choice."

"What do you mean?" Neji asked.

" **Imagine it this way** ," Kyuubi started. He had reverted to fox form and had stretched out over the recliner he had stolen. " **The class clown over there was the strongest shinobi in existence when Kakashi was chosen for the Sixth Hokage. How do you think he felt when that decision was made?** "

Neji shrugged. "Probably not very happy."

"Correct," Sasuke grunted. He did an exaggerated thumbs up. Said display prompted an equally enthusiastic display of a finger back at him from the Hyuuga.

" **Quite** ," Kyuubi continued. " **He was less than ecstatic, but he accepted the situation regardless. That being said, he was still** _ **quite**_ **vocal about his displeasure. Even well after he became a father and gotten married, he would still regularly pout about this.** "

Neji looked at the blonde child rolling on the ground. Such a thing should not be allowed to govern children.

" **So when he heard that Kakashi was finally stepping down, Naruto put in his name for first candidate almost as soon as the question was posed. Do you want to know what happened to everyone else who stepped up?** "

Neji felt that was an answer he didn't need.

" **Nothing. Because no one else stepped up. The instant anyone did, Naruto would drown the area in chakra and pure, unbridled malevolent intent. It was enough to give** _ **me**_ **the chills and I'm made of nothing but those two things.** "

Neji looked back at the blonde child that was still rolling on the ground. Such a thing should not be allowed to govern children.

"Kakashi had, at that point, come to a very reasonable conclusion." Sasuke had decided to pick up the lull in explanation. "Even if Naruto was the _worst_ Hokage that would ever grace the Five Great Nations, there would never be a single person to stand up to him and survive. No one would ever oppose him. The Leaf would fall or flourish because of Naruto, and Naruto alone, and there was absolutely no one who could change that fact. Naruto won the Hokage hat by a landslide."

" **Naruto would go on to govern the village through the use of** _ **overwhelmingly excessive**_ **Shadow Clones. It made life much more convenient, but also provided a horrifying truth**."

"And what would that be?" Neji asked, slightly horrified.

"That Naruto, if he so chose, could actually _be_ the Village Hidden in the Leaves. His clones, after a year, had opted to perform the roles of anyone who would otherwise be unable to. He became the police, carpenters, painters and even talk show hosts when the needs arose. There came a day when everyone realized that this man, who had during the war shared his chakra with _every other available ninja_ , had actually filled in a role for every single profession imaginable. We all learned something that day, Neji."

"And… and what was that?" Neji asked, now genuinely horrified.

" **That this is Naruto's world** ," Kyuubi answered. " **And we all live in it**."

All three entities turned to the childlike force of nature and quietly let it revel in its juvenile merriment. Every moment that it deluded itself into mediocrity was another moment that the world could rest in peace.

"Why the Sage was _he_ allowed to come up with the Talk no Jutsu?"

XxX

"I don't want to be here," Sasuke grumbled. He followed Naruto as he led the group through the hall to the examination room. They had already passed the fake examination room a floor below, and escaped the ordeal without incident. They were _supposed_ to tip off the group about the genjutsu, but decided against it. The gods would decide how to get them to their proper place.

Naruto smiled as his best friend pouted. "Neither do I, but we don't really have a choice."

" **We could blow up the town again** ," Kyuubi suggested. Sasuke perked up at the at those words. Since he was an Uchiha this wasn't readily noticeable.

"I like that idea. Let's do that," Sasuke agreed. Naruto shook his head.

"Been there, done that. We don't need to do it again."

Sasuke gritted his teeth. "I wasn't there, idiot."

"And whose fault is that?" Naruto asked.

" _Yours_."

"Oh right."

And just like that the two devolved into a shouting match. Their screams reverberated around the testing area until they made their way downstairs to the fake examination room. The children (and not so children) there looked around, before noticing everything that was off.

"Hey, this is only the second floor!" an observant Genin shouted.

All Genin proceeded to march up the stairs.

Back with the group, Sakura started massaging her forehead. "Must you two fight at every available moment?"

There was a garbled response from both boys that wasn't entirely understandable. This made sense, as Naruto currently was biting Sasuke on the head and Sasuke had his mouth full of Naruto's fist. Sakura sighed.

"I'm never going to be able to control you two, am I?" she asked. Her answer was met with a hum.

"No, it doesn't appear so," a lazy voice drawled. Sakura jumped when her teacher suddenly appeared behind her. After getting over her shock, she glared at the Jonin.

"Yo," Kakashi chanted, head half buried in a book. He waved lazily, not really caring that only one of his students was paying any attention to him.

"Kakashi-sensei? What are you doing here?" Sakura asked in lieu of her more occupied teammates. If Kakashi was concerned that the two stronger members of his squad, besides him of course, were currently rolling around on the ground, he didn't show it.

"I thought I'd stop by to give you all a little bit of encouragement, but…" The scarecrow stared at the two boys. He could feel the chakra building between them. "I think you guys are lively enough."

Sakura sighed, though this time was much more heavy. "Lively is an understatement." The pink haired girl then leaned forward, dropping her voice down to a whisper. "Do I _have_ to do this now, sensei? I don't think we're ready."

Kakashi eyed his two other students. Fire and wind natured chakra started to saturate the air in the hallway.

He looked back to his last student. "I think you're fine."

"Sensei, they're going to kill each other."

Kakashi waved her off, "they'll be fine."

Meanwhile, behind them, the air become noticeably both thicker and hotter.

"Sensei," Sakura pleaded. "Save me."

Her response was the whistling of air that signaled her sensei's departure. She hadn't even seen him move.

"Why me…" she whimpered as the explosion that heralded her teammates' bouts of fighting engulfed her.

XxX

"I hate you," Naruto mumbled. He was currently staring down Kabuto Yakushi, a Leaf "Genin" that was overall unimpressive. His silver hair reminded the young blonde of his teacher, but his charming, disarming smile and unassuming glasses made him entirely too expressive to be Kakashi.

"What was that, Naruto-kun?" Kabuto asked, his voice gentle and inviting.

"He says that he hates you," Sasuke responded. His voice was toneless.

"Well, yes, I gathered that much," Kabuto responded. "But why?"

"Because you're a prick," Naruto said. He had folded his arms. "That, and your glasses suck."

"Well, that's mean," Kabuto said with a frown. He looked genuinely hurt by the statement.

"It's also true," Sasuke picked up. "And I know you're faking that frown. You don't _feel_ any emotion besides lust. And even then it's only for Orochimaru."

Kabuto turned a sharp eye to Sasuke. "And how exactly would you know _that_?"

"I, uh," Sasuke stammered. "Guessed?"

"Well, that's a very dangerous guess," Kabuto responded, his silver eyebrows slightly furrowed. "And also untrue. I have about as much love for the Snake traitor as you do."

"Tell me about it," Naruto mumbled. He was promptly elbowed by his raven haired teammate.

"My idiot teammate aside, I don't think you should be giving out free information on potential test m\takers _right in front of them_. That's an easy way to get yourself killed."

"What?" Kabuto asked. "No way! I've done this for seven years and no one's ever had a problem with it before!"

Absently, Kabuto bent over to pick up an errant card that had fallen out of his pack. In doing so he accidently dodged a shuriken, which proceeded to fly into the chalkboard at the front of the room.

Neither Naruto nor Sasuke could tell whether the traitor did that on purpose.

"Anyway," Kabuto said as he stood back up. "I'm willing to share any information on anyone you would like. Any names in particular?"

Mulling it over, Naruto decided to finally give in. "Fine, tell me about Sasuke Uchiha."

Sasuke was a little less than enthused about this.

"Your own teammate, eh?" Kabuto asked, eyebrow raised. "I would think you would know everything about him."

"Yeah Naruto. He has a point," Sasuke supplied, his tone clipped.

"Nah. Looking around this room, I can tell that he's the biggest threat to me here. Let's see what you know."

On a side note, not many other listening teams took kindly to Naruto insulting them.

"Well, if you say so." Kabuto ruffled through his Ninja Info Cards to pull out one in specific. Upon finding it, the man channeled some chakra into it, revealing a picture of the child and some information under it. "Here we go. Sasuke Uchiha, twelve years of age. Some D-rank missions and… what's this? An A-rank mission under your belt? Impressive!"

Sasuke preened under the praise, even though it was severely lacking to his actual accomplishments.

"It also says here that you are an exceedingly accomplished Genin. Your biggest accomplishment being surviving an encounter with the rogue Mist Ninja Zabuza Momochi…"

"Well, I don't mean to brag…"

"… while being a vegetable."

"Wait what? No," Sasuke's façade was shattered immediately.

"No, it definitely says here that you were a vegetable. Care to explain?"

"I _wasn't_ a vegetable." Sasuke grumbled. Naruto placed a hand on his shoulder.

"You definitely were. It's okay. Embrace it."

Sasuke brushed the blonde's hand off. "I don't _have_ to embrace anything!"

"Then you'll never get better."

"I would have never been _worse_ if it weren't for _you_."

"Sasuke-kun. If you don't want to get better then I'll just take care of you again," Sakura said. Both of her male teammates paled.

"I was a vegetable," Sasuke said. His voice was lifeless.

"Ah, that's good. I was afraid my cards were inaccurate. Anyone else?" Kabuto looked around the room.

"Yes, I want information on Naruto Uzumaki."

Naruto glared at Kiba.

"What?" the dog boy asked. "I've heard you've gotten stronger recently. It'll be good to know how strong!"

Kabuto clicked his teeth. "Well, if you must." He then searched through his deck. Following the same procedure as he did Sasuke, Kabuto read off Naruto's card.

"Same mission history as the Uchiha, no surprise there as they're on the same team. Hmm, it also says here that your chakra levels are through the roof."

Naruto smirked. "You know what they say about men with big chakra levels…"

"It also says here you're responsible for an S-ranked disaster?"

Sasuke glared at his teammate. "What the hell did you do now?"

Naruto shrugged.

XxX

Elsewhere, a multi-colored kunai pierced the heart of Aoi, shattering his Raijin no Ken in the process. As the missing nin fell to the ground, he could only gape at the sheer destruction that was left in the knife's wake.

XxX

"I bet your very birth was an S-ranked disaster," Sasuke teased. Naruto stuck his tongue out in response.

"Apparently, that's not your worse feature though. Did you… create a forbidden jutsu?"

"Wait, what?" Naruto asked. It was a question mirrored by almost everyone else in the room.

"Yes… yes!" Kabuto exclaimed, holding up the card as if it were some holy creation. "It was you! You created the famed jutsu that Master Orochimaru has been trying to recreate!"

"What was that, now?" Sasuke asked.

"Nothing!" Kabuto covered up. His excitement wasn't abated in the slightest by his slip up. "The famed jutsu that shakes the Elemental Nations to its core! Done with no handseals and unavoidable or reversible, labeled an SS-class Genjutsu of the highest caliber, the Talk no Jutsu! You're the one who created it?"

Naruto chuckled awkwardly. "Heh… maybe?"

Every other available ninja moved away from him.

Sasuke, however, moved closer. He had a hypothesis that, if already the subject to it once, one could not be affected by the technique again. He hoped it was true. Leaning in, the last loyal Uchiha whispered in his best friend's ear. "How do they know about this already?"

" **Gramps said that he'd tell the gods about it. I'm guessing he actually went through with it. With the recent disaster around you, Uchiha, I'm not surprised.** " The Kyuubi managed to sound sleepy.

"So they banned it here?" Naruto asked. He then shrugged his shoulder. "Still gonna use it."

"Wh-what?" Kabuto stammered. "But… the Talk no Jutsu is banned in all five nations!"

Naruto shrugged again. "And who exactly is going to stop me from using it?"

"You'll be hunted down?"

"I'll use it on the hunter ninjas."

"The Kages will come after you!" Kabuto screamed.

"I'll use it on them too."

"B-but…" Kabuto was at a loss for words.

"Yes?" Naruto asked, an eyebrow raised.

"I don't… I don't know…"

"I thought so." Naruto nodded, a self-satisfied smirk on his face. "Now why don't you go sit down over there as you contemplate the futility of your almost meaningless existence?"

Kabuto nodded blankly, before slinking off into a corner. Looking at the man walk feebly away, Sasuke prepared himself to do something he'd never thought he'd ever have to do.

Comfort Kabuto.

"There there," Sasuke cooed, rubbing his hand on the traitor's back. "It's okay. The first time I realized it was all pointless, I was pretty depressed too. I was also missing an arm."

Kabuto took a glance at the twelve year old's arms. They were both intact.

He made a mental note to write down "insanity" on the side effects of receiving the Talk no Jutsu. He then looked at the blonde boy run over to the Suna Jinchuuriki and pat him on the back. Hard.

He made a mental note to write down "insanity" on the side effects of _administering_ the Talk no Jutsu.

XxX

"H-here… N-Naruto-kun. Y-you can c-opy off my paper…" a timid, almost fully withdrawn lavender haired girl whispered. Her lightly tinted violet eyes could barely look in his direction.

For it was the written part of the Chunin Exams, and she was sitting next her crush: Naruto Uzumaki.

Little did she know that she would be the future _wife and mother of his children_ , but she couldn't be faulted for that. _She_ didn't come from the future.

Naruto _did_ in fact come from the future. He still had the same difficulty looking Hinata in the eyes.

"I-its okay, Hinata. I don't need…" Naruto started. He was feeling incredibly guilty, and thus, incredibly nervous while talking to his future wife. She had harbored feelings for him since they were barely older than toddlers, which mean she definitely liked him now. Naruto had experience dealing with girls with crushes on him—after he became the hero of the Fourth Shinobi World War he had _many_ adoring fans. He didn't, however, have any experience dealing with girls he liked back, which led him to his current situation.

Also, a one chance test was going on right now and cheating was prohibited. He was being encouraged to cheat, yes, but he couldn't be caught doing it. Looking over and blatantly copying would be the most obvious way of doing so.

Hinata didn't like his refusal very much. "B-but… if you don't copy then you'll fail!"

Naruto shook his head. "What? No, I'll be fine Hinata, it's just a…"

"Naruto-kun, if you don't pass this test, you can't become Chunin!"

"Well, yes, Hinata, but still, I don't need to…"

"If y-you don't make Chunin… you can't become Jonin… and if you… if you…"

"Hinata, calm down!" Naruto whispered as harshly as he dared. It didn't seem like any of the proctors noticed he was talking, but that was liable to change. "I'll be fi-"

"You won't become Hokage, Naruto-kun!"

 _That_ exclamation brought alarm. Several eyes darted in their direction, but both test takers had assumed a less suspicious posture. No one said anything, so after a while the two relaxed.

Naruto spoke up first. "It's fine, Hinata! Thank you for your concern, but I'll be fine."

Hinata spied her crush's paper. There was absolutely nothing on it save an unsavory picture of Ibiki, their test proctor. She stared back at Naruto, disbelief evident in her eyes.

"I, uh… I promise?" Naruto resisted the urge to scratch the back of his neck.

The deadpan look Hinata sent him no doubt showed her reluctance to go along with it.

XxX

Morino Ibiki was a hulking monstrosity of a man. Angular in all that he was, the man was a moving mountain of muscle clad in nothing but black clothes, half of which was leather. He was a dangerous, intimidating ninja who very few had the honor of meeting. Even fewer actually wanted to do such a thing.

Such a man was the proctor of the Chunin Exams. Looking over the cute little future killers with a scowl, he prepared to administer the tenth question. This question would determine whether or not any of them would continue on in the Exams.

The behemoth smiled on the inside, but nevertheless remained stoic on the outside. Opening his mouth, he asked, "Well, the tenth question is-"

"Hurry the hell up!" Naruto yelled, irritation marring his face.

Wait, what?

"Yeah, we don't have all day, Ibiki!" the contestant Ibiki recognized as the Last Uchiha followed up. He felt a vein in his forehead start to twitch.

"I would have started already if you two hadn't started-"

"Then start already!" Naruto yelled, even though he was at the front of the class and thus had no reason to. The Uchiha nodded.

"We've been here far too long already. Just let us go already."

"I'm trying to, but-"

"Screw it, I'm walking out myself," Naruto said, before getting up. Sasuke quickly followed suit and, seeing her teammates walking out, Sakura had to follow as well.

Noticing his chance escaping, Ibiki had to speak quickly. He couldn't fail them, they hadn't refused the question, no matter how rude they were being. "You all pass!"

Naruto and Sasuke smiled.

XxX

"I forgot how skinny Anko was," Naruto whispered to his best friend. Sasuke nodded.

"I forgot she used to only wear a trenchcoat."

" _ **I**_ **forgot that she existed** ," Kyuubi drawled as he lay spread eagle outside The Forest of Death. Every so often someone tripped on his tail.

"People have value that goes beyond being food, Kyuubi," Naruto whispered. His response was a nonchalant shrug from the fox and a kunai to the cheek from Anko.

Said Snake Lady appeared behind Naruto, catching the kunai in the process. Slowly, and with a tongue far longer than it should have been, Anko licked the blood off the kunai before whispering in the young blonde's ear. "You should really pay attention when someone is talking, kiddo."

Naruto smiled, an act that caused both Sasuke and Kyuubi to clear out.

"So should you," Naruto whispered back and, before Anko could react, exploded. Anko and Sakura, who was still in the vicinity of the blast, were sent careening away. After a while the smoke from the Exploding Clone settled down, revealing a laughing Naruto in the center of its crater.

"I've always wanted to do that," Naruto cackled. "But it would have been immature for the Hokage to take revenge on one of his own soldiers."

Anko groaned from her new trench in the ground.


	14. Chapter 14: The Late Chapter

_**Okay, I'm a little late. Medical issues came up, I'm sorry. This is chapter for now my everything hurts I'm sorry again but medical problems suck.**_

 _ **Plus I have class now.**_

 _ **Read review comment, complain. It's all okay, I deserve it. I just hope this makes your day a little better maybe.**_

* * *

"No," Sasuke stated simply, sitting down cross-legged outside the gates that led to the Forest of Death. The forest, aptly named, was really a Training Ground that the ninja of Konoha used occasionally. Except not really. It was exceedingly dangerous, bordering on suicidal to enter with its deadly creatures and somehow even deadlier plant life. It's trees, while normally a staple of the Fire Nation, were unusually high. If you slipped while traversing them you were basically dead to fall damage.

None of these reasons were why Sasuke refused to enter the forest though.

"Stop being a coward," Naruto yelled. He pulled on the Uchiha's wrist as he tried to force him into the forest. "Get your evil hickey and be done with it."

"No," Sasuke restated. He said it as if it was an answer as obvious as the weather. "I'm not going through that again. If the trend thus far holds, nothing can be changed about this world. I'm not getting the cursed seal again. Do you know what that's like?" At Naruto's dumbfounded expression Sasuke continued. "Imagine a pedophile who just _loves_ to stretch his 's' continually whispering into your ear. THAT'S what it's like. I'm not doing it."

Naruto pouted. "But it's only gonna be for a little bit!"

Sasuke's face paled. "You call three years ' _a little bit'_?"

"Compared to the rest of our lives? Yes!"

Sasuke's eye twitched. "That's easy for you to say, _you_ spent those three years running around with a _good_ sensei perving on girls! I had to protect my chastity every night!"

Kyuubi opened an eyelid. He was dozing off while leaning against the gate surrounding the Forest of Death. " **I thought you said that Orochimaru** _ **didn't**_ **try to mess with you?** "

"You stay out of this!" Sasuke snapped.

" _Good_?" Naruto asked. "Jiraiya, I loved him, but he was a _terrible_ sensei! Half the time he was off peeping on women!"

Sasuke rolled his eyes. "Oh, how terrible."

"I don't need your sarcasm right now."

"And _I_ don't need your bullshit. Neither of us are happy."

" **I'm kind of happy** ," Kurama said from the sidelines. The glare he earned was legendary.

"You stay out of this," Naruto growled. Kurama threw his hands up in resignation.

" **Whatever. You guys can go make out in peace. I'm going to go burn the forest down**." A burst of crimson chakra later, and the fox was gone. Not five seconds later did the forest start to go up in smoke.

Of course neither boy cared much, still enthralled in their argument.

"You can't honestly be telling me that _Jiraiya_ peeping on girls was any worse than _Orochimaru_ trying to see how much of his snake he could, 'make you handle'."

Naruto paled. "He was talking about his summons right?"

Sasuke shuddered. "I sure hope he was."

"Well, regardless, at least he was actually training you through all of that! I came back from my three year training with a bigger Rasengan!"

Sasuke quirked his eyebrow. "He did all of _that_ for you? I'm surprised you had enough control to get out of bed in the morning. Truly, Jiraiya was a genius among men."

"And apparently Orochimaru was too. He was able to see something _attractive_ about a sculpture like you."

Sasuke smirked. "You're just jealous of my Uchiha genes."

Naruto smirked himself. "The same genes that gave you those girly eyelashes?"

"They're not girly!" Sasuke screamed immediately. Apparently a nerve had been struck.

"Oh, no. Of course not," Naruto said soothingly, his wicked smirk still in place. "But quick question, which tools do you use to get them so curly?"

Naruto then had to dodge a kunai wreathed in black flames.

"Yeah, this is going about as well as I thought having you in the past would be."

"They're not girly!" Sasuke screamed once more, another pure black kunai in hand.

"You know, with all of your training with Orochimaru, I'm not surprised most of your attacks are either _flaming_ or _positively electric_." Once again Naruto had to dodge more attacks, with Chidori powered senbon joining the artillery list. Not minding the deadly onslaught in the slightest, the future Hokage simply laughed as he fled his way into the Forest of Death, his male teammate in hot pursuit.

"Well, you've convinced me Sasuke! I don't think Jiraiya is so bad anymore!" Naruto called over his shoulder.

"I will _murder_ you one day, Naruto!"

Naruto just laughed even harder.

Meanwhile, back at the entrance, Sakura could only gape at the wonton destruction and hostility. She hadn't paid the two boys' interaction any heed before because, come on, they were _always_ arguing. And then the weapons started flying, and were they on fire? Black fire?

Again, Sakura could only gape as the two raced off into the forest, effectively leaving her behind.

"Why am I surrounded by maniacs?" She asked herself before running off after them.

XxX

Naruto dumped the body of a Chuunin hopeful at his feet. Sasuke and Sakura looked at the boy with alarm.

"What's that?" Sakura asked. Naruto shrugged.

"Some guy trying to impersonate me, I guess. He tried to blindside me while I was peeing. How's the search for the other scroll?"

"Not well," Sasuke answered. His eyes, Sharingan active, were scanning the forest. Nothing came up. "All I see are the teammates of the guy you just beat up, and I'm pretty sure they don't have the scroll we need."

"They don't." Naruto then dropped the scroll he found on the body of the ninja who ambushed him. "Though this may be a fake. My clones are going to search the other two."

Sasuke winced when he saw how exactly the other two were being handled with his Sharingan. Apparently the fox had joined the clones in torturing the poor ninja. "Did you _have_ to send Kurama?"

"I didn't send Kurama."

"Oh," Sasuke said. "Then that's just his own personal touch."

"Wait, who's Kurama?" Sakura asked. She noticed she was starting to be left out of the conversation a lot recently.

"You don't wanna know," the two boys answered simultaneously.

"And why not?" Sakura couldn't fathom why she wouldn't want to know about this mysterious fourth member of their team. Besides Kakashi. He wasn't really actually on the team anyway.

Not like he helped them unless he _had_ to.

"I don't think you could handle him just yet." Naruto was the one to reply. He did so around poking at the unconscious body before him. Somewhere out in the forest Sakura could hear faint screams, or rather, _lots_ of faint screams. She dismissed them rather easily as _there had been quite a few screams_.

XxX

Elsewhere Gaara had the sense to be slightly guilty. Only slightly though. This guilt had him hesitate, and the person he was currently suspending in the air in a coffin of sand became hopeful.

"Are… are you not going to kill me after all?" the poor Genin asked. Turning his attention back to the ninja, a child no older than he was, Gaara casually closed his extended hand, in turn making the sand contract as well. The poor boy died instantly.

"No," Gaara responded, before turning away to leave.

Neither of his siblings had the courage to tell him that it was probably more productive to answer _before_ killing his prey.

XxX

"No," Sasuke said, arms folded and indignant. The Snake Sannin, Orochimaru, stood before him with a bemused smile on his face.

"Whatever are you talking about, Sssssassssuke?"

Said Genin shuddered upon hearing the older man's speech tick. In later years Orochimaru would drop the "S" thing, but by then Sasuke had adopted a healthy policy of _never being within speaking distance of the man_.

"I'm talking about you," Sasuke said. If possible his scowl deepened. "Just no. To you, your plans, and just… just in general. No to you."

"No to me?" The way the Snake Sannin said it was mocking and somehow sultry. Memories of unpleasant conversations were suddenly flowing back to the boy.

"And everything you stand for, yes."

"Ssso, yess to everything I sstand for?"

Sasuke sputtered. "What? No! No to you!"

"No two me's?"

"You're intentionally fucking with me!" Sasuke pointed at the man conspiratorially.

"No, not yet, but I plan to," Orochimaru hissed. Again, his words were both sultry and threatening. Sasuke paled. Somehow he felt that the Sannin took his words differently from the way he meant them.

"I'm not going anywhere _near_ you."

"Sssomehow I don't think you have the choissse."

"That doesn't even have an 'S'!" Sasuke screamed, before dodging a barrage of weaponry. Jumping backward, Sasuke activated his base level Sharingan before engaging the older man in a fight. Sakura, of course, could only stand and stare.

"That's Orochimaru?" she asked. Sasuke, even though he was in the middle of a fight, had the Uchiha wherewithal to sneer.

"I think that's been established." Sasuke then dodged an open palm strike. Unfortunately that open palm turned into a snake attack.

"No, I know, but, I mean…"

"Spit it out, Sakura!" Sasuke yelled, before trying to strike out at Orochimaru. The man dodged it by bending in an impossible way, before smiling.

"Only quittersss sspit," he said, earning him a glare from Sasuke.

"Stop that."

"Never."

"I _mean_ ," Sakura said, getting annoyed at being ignored in conversations, "that he doesn't really seem like the Orochimaru we've been taught about."

"Oh?" Orochimaru started, looking genuinely amused. "What did they teach you about me?"

"Oh, I dunno. Lots of small things, but mainly they gave me the idea that you were a lot... I dunno. Movie theater evil?"

"Movie… theater evil?" Orochimaru repeated.

"Yeah, kinda like those stereotypical movie villia-"

"Excuse me!" Sasuke screamed around dodging a kunai strike from his snakelike opponent. Unfortunately Orochimaru then _threw the kunai_. Sasuke dodged that too, but the kunai then turned into more snakes.

Narrowly escaping even those, Sasuke turned to look at his pink haired teammate. She hadn't really moved since the fight started. "Why are you conversing with the enemy instead of, I dunno, _helping me_."

Sakura tilted her head. "Do you think that I could do much?" Sasuke turned over the thought in his head before concluding that, no, she couldn't. He relayed as much. "Then what do you want me to do?"

"Having a friendly conversation with him wasn't at the _top_ of the things I could think of."

Sakura shrugged. "At this point I can't see any reason not to. First Zabuza now Orochimaru, I think my plan of engagement is just fine."

"Sssshe hasss a point. I haven't attacked her once ssssince we ssstarted fighting."

"No one asked _you_ ," Sasuke hissed, before realizing that his hissing attracted more snakes. With a quick fire jutsu he burned those, only for more to replace them. "I know how you're summoning so many, and it still annoys me."

Orochimaru quirked an eyebrow. "And how do you know that?"

"I'm from the future," Sasuke deadpanned. Orochimaru stopped for a second, obviously not expecting that, before continuing his attack.

"I'm okay with the crazy oness," he hissed. Sasuke rolled his eyes.

"Of course you are."

XxX

" **You have an entire repertoire of deadly techniques, and you choose to blow up the snake the same way a second time**."

Sitting in the remains of a giant summoned snake, Naruto just sighed as he wiped the guts out of his hair.

"You don't fix what isn't broken."

" **Well, yes, but I'm pretty sure this was one of the things the gods would have let you get away with changing. Did you** _ **have**_ **to blow it up by flooding it with clones again? I thought you more creative**."

"Oh, I am. I had dozens of ways of getting out."

" **Then why didn't you use one of those**?" Kyuubi asked.

Naruto looked around at the snake viscera around him. Sighing once more, he got up, before stretching. "Because this way's a lot simpler. I don't remember which way I was thrown, so I would have had to make clones to find Orochimaru anyway. This way, I don't have to make more clones."

Kyuubi nodded, seeing the logic behind his charge's reasoning. Then, he turned to the boy. " **I see your point. Very smart reasoning indeed**."

Done stretching, he then took off to where a clone had recently popped, courtesy of, believe it or not, Sasuke.

Kyuubi caught up with the boy easily. " **Yes, smart reasoning. Unfortunately, it's exactly** _ **because**_ **it's smart reasoning that I'm reluctant to believe that you thought of it. What was the** _ **real**_ **reason you used clones?** "

Naruto deadpanned. "I told you. Convenience."

" **Oh really?** "

"Yes, really." Naruto, who could run through trees asleep, refused to make eye contact.

" **Boy, I have never known you to do things for convenience's sake. In fact, I'm pretty sure that doing things efficiently is actually harder for you**."

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

" **I've seen you open cans of soup by coming up with a way to spin a kunai using a Rasengan and applying it to the foodstuffs."**

"Truly an engineering masterpiece on my end."

" **Quite** ," Kyuubi responded. " **However, when introduced to a can opener by your meatbag of a wife, you almost destroyed the kitchen**."

Naruto, who still hadn't turned around, had the decency to at least _sound_ indignant. "Those things are confusing and stupid. It's not my fault."

" **Naruto, you put the can under the blade and press a button**."

"It's not that easy!"

" **Naruto!** _ **I**_ **can do it! In my** _ **fox**_ **form. Where I don't have** _ **thumbs**_ **.** "

"Why the hell do you know you could do that?"

" **Because I tried it!** "

"Why?" Naruto wailed.

" **For this exact reason! To prove how utterly backwards you are!** "

"Well congratulation!" Naruto screamed. The sarcasm was almost literally dripping from his voice. "You're successfully the biggest pain in my butt!"

" **Are you sure? The reason you have so much pain down there might be because you're so full of shit. Now what is the real reason you used clones on the snake?** "

Naruto sputtered, before doubling his pace. "Is that the Snake's signature? We better hurry on ahead." Kyuubi rolled his eyes.

" **I'll have you tell me eventually, you know I will**."

"There's nothing to tell."

The two then traveled in silence. Kyuubi hummed the last bit of way. After a minute, Naruto coughed, before speaking his next words in less than a whisper.

"And my decision on clones had nothing to do with the fact that the inside of that snake was incredibly gross, and I just used the first thought that came to my mind."

Kyuubi smiled at the confession, but didn't press the issue further.

XxX

Back in the clearing, Orochimaru was still standing on a tree trunk, stunned. True, he had Sasuke pinned to a tree by a rather vicious chokehold, but that was a lesser point. Staring the boy in his red eyes, Orochimaru asked, "Did you really just throw a knife at your own teammate?"

Sasuke, who didn't seem too uncomfortable in his situation nodded. "Seems about right."

"Why?"

Sasuke shrugged. "I've thrown worse things at him."

"What if it wasn't a clone?" Orochimaru asked.

"Then he would have been hit." Sasuke answered like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Well, yes. And are you not alarmed at all by that?"

"He's survived worse. Can you believe he lost his arm once? Survived all throughout the night until sunrise while bleeding out. Amazing boy, that man."

It was around here that Naruto made his grand re-entrance into the part of forest his teammates were in. Seeing the conversation going on, he picked up from what he heard.

"You survived that arm loss blood loss too, bastard. Don't sell yourself short."

Orochimaru looked between the two boys. They had fully intact arms.

"Took you long enough to get back," Sasuke said around shallow breaths. He could barely breathe for the situation he was in, and yet taunting Naruto still seemed to take priority.

"I'm sorry, a giant snake ate me. You should try it sometime. Really fun."

Sasuke smirked. "I _have_ tried it. It was part of my training. It's not so bad once you get used to it."

"Ugh," Naruto retched. "I'd rather stick with toads."

"Oh? And they're better?"

"Immensely," Naruto said. He had taken to twirling a kunai around his finger. "They don't eat meat, so you usually just hang out in their mouths and chill on their tongues. Once you get over the swampy smell, it's actually pretty comfortable."

Sasuke stared. "I'm sure."

Orochimaru, however, wasn't so enthralled. "Are they… are they ignoring me?" Sakura patted the older man on his shoulder. As she was quite a bit shorter than he was, she had to stretch to do so.

"Welcome to my world," the pink haired Genin said, attempting to console the man. "They'll be done soon."

"But… but I'm currently _choking_ _him_."

"Don't try to fight it."

"Anyway," Naruto said, finally quitting his twirl. "How about we get this started?"

"Oh, sure." And just like that Sasuke exploded in a miasma of purple chakra. Rubbing his neck, Sasuke looked fully at home with his Susanoo finally covering him. "That's better."

"It sssure isss," Orochimaru hissed, a manic expression on his face. Sasuke paled once more, suddenly uncomfortable again.

"Wait, what? No! You're supposed to be intimidated!"

"For whatever reason would I be intimidated, Sssassuke-kun? Rather, I'm exsssited!"

"W-why?" Sasuke asked, his voice nearly a whisper.

"Becaussse, when I'm insssside you, that beautiful technique will be mine!"

Sasuke couldn't hide the utter horror on his face.

"Kami, Sage and all deities above. _This_ is what you dealt with?"

"You build up a tolerance," Sasuke replied after his initial shock wore off.

"Then why are you still whiter than a sheet?"

" _Apparently_ the tolerance wears off."

And wear off it did, because it didn't take Orochimaru a second thought before he lunged forward, his Sword of Kusanagi extending from his open mouth. Diving in head first, Orochimaru attempted to impale the young shinobi on the top of his blade. The Kusanagi managed to pierce the armor, but it didn't get much farther than the tip. Sasuke was still a little too unnerved to do anything about it.

"Interessssting," Orochimaru hissed. "Even my blade, which can cut anything, can't quite make it through your chakra armor."

"You, no touchy!" Naruto yelled while grabbing the Sannin's shoulder. Stunned at how the boy had gotten to him so fast, he wasn't prepared for the surprisingly strong pre-teen to suddenly spin him. After several rotations, the boy finally deemed Orochimaru sufficiently dizzy, before releasing him and letting him indent into a tree. "Only _I_ can touchy!"

Sasuke grimaced. "You no touchy either."

"We'll see about that."

Sasuke scowled. "Only Sarada touchy. And only once a year. During her birthday."

"You mean that stupid forehead poke you do?"

"It's not stupid. It's symbolic."

"Of what?"

"Fondness and a bond that transcends time and space."

Naruto stared at his best friend. "Bullshit." Sasuke stared back, face impassive. Well, more impassive than normal. "Not bullshit?"

"Not bullshit," Sasuke answered.

"Oh. Well, does _Sarada_ know what it's symbolic of?"

"Of course she does." Sasuke answered as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Did you tell her?"

Sasuke's sputtering was not a good sign.

"Well, not exactly."

"She _doesn't_ know!"

"Yes she does!" Sasuke yelled back, his Susanoo disappearing from around him. Apparently it was hard to hear in the confines of a suit of chakra armor. "She's _my_ daughter! She inherited my genius! She should know what it means!"

Naruto wasn't particularly listening. "Holy Truth Seeking Balls! You've been going around all this time poking your daughter in the forehead and never told her why? The poor girl must've been so confused! I bet she made up her own reason!"

"No she didn't! She knew!"

"Bullshit!"

"Then why does she always look so happy whenever I do it? Huh?" Sasuke asked hysterical.

"Because she's probably just glad that you're talking to her at all!"

Sasuke was silent for a bit. "That's not true."

"Come on, we both know she's starved for attention from her daddy."

"I always figured Sakura gave her enough attention…"

At this Sakura perked up from the side. "What now? What was that?" Both boys turned to look at her in alarm, having completely forgetten she was there.

"I, uh, I mean…" Sasuke stammered, not sure how to deflect the conversation, or even how much he needed to. He wasn't sure how much she'd heard.

"I heard you say my name," Sakura yelled.

"I didn't say your name!" Sasuke yelled back.

"You sure? I heard someone say my name!"

"No one said your name!" Naruto yelled.

"Okay, just asking if you said my name!"

"No one is saying any names!"

"Oh, but you will be ssscreaming MY name!" Orochimaru hissed, before lunging behind Sasuke and putting his evil hickey on the boy's neck. Hissing at the pain, Sasuke could only grunt before the Snake Sannin detached himself and quickly fled. For all of the two boys' ability, they could never quite match Orochimaru's slipperiness.

Hand quickly clasping the now tender spot on his neck, Sasuke could only describe the emotion he felt as pure, unbridled rage. "Damn it Orochimaru!"

This screaming went on for a short while before Sasuke had the sense of mind to finally stop. Waiting a bit for the boy to catch his breath, Naruto then walked over to his best friend, a wicked smile on his face.

"You know, technically, you _did_ just scream his name."

Sasuke immediately started screaming again.


	15. Chapter 15: Squabbles

**_Sorry about the late update. I had school, and family health issues, and a birthday in between then and now._**

 ** _Also I have non-fanfiction things I'm trying to write. Fanfiction isn't my only fiction guys! I'm not exactly sure how to get into writing for income yet, but it's my dream. One day, right?_**

 ** _Anyway, here's the chapter. I apologize for the wait. Enjoy, and any constructive comments would be appreciated. I want to improve for you guys as much as myself._**

* * *

"Kiba," Naruto muttered, his voice barely above a whisper. He had spoken louder earlier, but the attempts just seemed so foolish now.

"And _after_ we're done punching you, we're gonna start _kicking_ you too!" the dog-like boy boasted, his hands on his hips and his canine companion, Akamaru, yipping supportively along from on top of his head.

"Kiba," Naruto repeated, a little louder this time. His hand rubbed at the bridge of his nose to try to stop the oncoming headache, but he could tell it was a futile effort.

"And when we're done _punching_ ya," Kiba continued, seemingly unaware of his former classmate's ire, "we're gonna start biting ya too!"

"Kiba, please," Naruto said, his voice now louder now that he could reign his irritation no longer. When it was apparent the dog boy had no intention to listen, however, Sasuke yelled from the sidelines.

"Just kick his ass, Naruto!"

And apparently that was all that was needed. As soon as the proctor, a man by the name of Gekko, signaled the start, the two boys sprung away from each other. The one on one duel between Chunin hopefuls started, and it was to be the first of many that day.

"Okay," Kiba howled, retrieving a pill from his pocket. "It's time to rock Naruto! Are you ready, boy?" Kiba asked his puppy. The little dog barked his approval, and Kiba grinned in response. Tossing the pill up above his head for Akamaru to eat, Kiba growled in challenge.

"We're gonna _destroy_ you Naruto. Once Akamaru eats that soldier pill, you'll see why he's named what he's named."

Naruto, his face scrunched up, just started tossing something small up and down in his right hand. "A pill? You mean this one?"

Kiba looked up, only to catch the eyes of his still white puppy. Akamaru looked back down and, upon meeting his partner's eyes, whined in a very high pitch.

"Buddy? Where's your pill?" Kiba asked. Akamaru whined again, before staring at their opponent. Naruto just grinned. Catching the small object he was tossing between his fingers, he held it out to the two. Kiba's eyes widened.

"Is that…"

"Your pill?" Naruto asked. He looked at it almost wistfully, before crushing it into dust. "Well, it _was_ anyway. I'm sorry Kiba, but I'm not letting you use that."

Kiba stared silently at his opponent for a bit, before reaching into his pack and retrieving another pill. Carefully this time, Kiba threw his pill up to his dog companion, watching as it sailed through the air. Akamaru, jaws agape, tried once more to snatch it out the air, only for it to vanish once again. Deadpan, the dog boy stared at his old classmate, sure that he had the pill again. Sure enough, Naruto had it between his fingers.

"Why are you doing this?" he asked. Naruto chuckled, before crushing the pill.

"It's funny."

"You can't do that forever," Kiba growled, pulling out yet another pill. Before he even tossed it Naruto had it in his hand.

"We'll see, dog breath," Naruto said, before crushing the pill once more. Now both Kiba and Akamaru were growling and, seeing what the challenge was now, pulled out his entire bag of pills. Apparently he was prepared for this outcome.

"Bring it on, ramen boy."

XxX

Up in the balcony, the other Chunin hopefuls couldn't believe what they were seeing.

"Are they… are they really doing this?" Choji asked around a mouthful of chips. Sakura nodded, a solemn look on her face.

"You get used to it. You should see him when he's serious."

Shikamaru glanced at the girl: an impressive feat seeing as a full-scale invasion probably couldn't rouse the boy from his sleep. "I'm pretty sure that Naruto is moving fast enough down there to snatch the pill from midair and get back to where he was standing before anyone can notice."

Sure enough, Naruto was doing just that. Kiba's bag of pills was just getting smaller, but the dog boy was not giving up. He had resorted to tossing multiple pills at once, but that wasn't helping.

Why Naruto didn't just take the bag of pills was anyone's guess.

"That's not him when he's serious?" Shikamaru asked.

"I've seen him open a rations bar with wind chakra."

Shikamaru's was surprised. This wasn't readily apparent however, as a Nara's rendition of surprise is a slightly less sleepy look.

"Isn't utilization of wind chakra a Chunin level skill?" he asked. Sakura shrugged.

"I'm starting to debate that idea. He also used it to scratch his nose. His hands weren't even full, he just didn't feel like moving his arms. If nature manipulation is _that_ easy, I'm starting to doubt our village's system."

"Mrgh," Shikamaru said. His eyes started to droop again. Sakura stared at him.

"How are you tired again already?"

"Mrghgh," Shikamaru grunted.

"What?" Sakura asked.

"He said he uses a lot more brainpower, so it makes sense he'd be a lot more tired." The answer came from Choji.

Sakura stared at him. "You understood that?"

"Yeah, can't you?"

Sakura stared at him.

XxX

Back down in the stadium, Kiba was on his last couple of pills. "Aren't you getting tired of crushing these? They cost quite a lot, and you've set me back… a lot."

Naruto, with pill dust up to his ankles surrounding him, shrugged his shoulders. "I have nothing better to do. Honestly, I'm surprised you kept going as long as you did."

Kiba smirked. "A true Inuzuka never backs down from a challenge!" To accentuate this point, he tossed another pill to Akamaru. The puppy bit at it, only for it to disappear right before his mouth closed.

"Dude, you literally snatched that from my dog's mouth."

"Yeah, I know. There's some literary irony in there somewhere," Naruto said while crushing the pill.

XxX

"You said there's a _what_?"

"A living, sentient kunai made of rainbows following us around, yes," Sakura said, her voice even and her face straight. If she weren't the kind of straight laced person she was, the looks they had thrown her way would have been more incredulous than they already were.

"You're lying," Ino said, arms folded. The platinum blonde wore some very fashionable purple clothes, and was tempted to use her family's techniques to see into her former best friend's head to find out what was wrong with it.

"I assure you that I am not. Just last week it came to check up on us as we were coming back from our C-rank mission. Naruto waved at it."

"I'm sorry, Sakura, but I don't believe you. How could a kunai have sentience?" Choji asked. The idea was somehow alien to him, a boy who could grow to the size of a house.

"Fine, ask Sasuke-kun. He was there. Sasuke?" Sakura asked. Said Uchiha turned at the mention of his name. He raised a finely cared for eyebrow. "Isn't a magical sentient kunai following us around?"

"I wouldn't say it was _following_ us, no. But it is checking up on us every so often."

"See?" Sakura said, face smug.

"Mrfgl," Shikamaru yawned. Sakura turned to Choji.

"He said 'But Sasuke isn't known to be the most mentally stable. His word doesn't mean much.'"

Sakura turned back to the lazy genius.

"Shikamaru!" Sakura yelled, before turning to Sasuke. "Did you hear what he said about you?"

Sasuke grunted. "I can't exactly argue that logic, really. Spot on as usual, Nara."

Said Nara grunted. "Hn."

Sasuke nodded his approval of Shikamaru's response.

Changing tactics, Sakura turned to her other teammate. "Naruto! Isn't there a magical kunai following us around?"

Naruto, who was in the middle of crushing another pill, looked up from what he was doing to answer his female teammate. "Well," he yelled, "I wouldn't say it was _following_ us exactly…"

While he was answering, Kiba managed to get Akamaru to eat his very last pill.

"Damn it, look what you did Sakura!"

Up in the spectator's balcony, Sakura couldn't care less about her teammate's match. "See? Naruto confirmed it too!"

"It is common knowledge that Naruto is a prankster," Shino added from the sidelines. Sasuke, who was half listening, found it hard to recall the boy's name. "His word doesn't mean much either."

To this, Sakura was forced to turn to her teacher, who was reading smut in the corner. She made to call him, then thought of his reputation as well, and stopped.

"I can't really ask anyone to validate this for me," Sakura whimpered. Ino placed a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"I'm sorry your team is full of untrustworthy people. At least you have that hunk Sasuke."

Sakura sighed. "Yeah, I guess. It only kind of makes up for all the weirdos I keep running into. If I encounter another high ranked ninja disaster because of them, I'm going to cry."

XxX

Gaara sneezed. Since his sand usually kept dust out of his nose, he took the unfamiliar action as an attack on his person. Since he was using the bathroom at the time, everyone in that bathroom died.

XxX

Back down in the arena, Naruto was sidestepping wave after wave of spinning dog tornados.

"You can't dodge forever!" screamed Kiba from his dog tornado. "My _Gatsuga_ is invincible!"

Naruto yawned. "Oh really?"

"Yeah!" Kiba yelled as he was sidestepped once more. "It's only a matter of time!"

"Time is exactly the thing I have too much of."

"What was that?" Kiba asked.

"Nothing."

XxX

"So uh, Kakashi?" Sasuke asked, uncertain. The Hatake looked up from his book, but seemed pained to do so.

"Yes, my cute little student?"

"Are you going to do anything about this?" Sasuke pointed to the Curse Mark prominently spinning on his neck. Kakashi shrugged.

"Do you think I need to?"

" _Yesss, do you think he needsss to Sssssasssuke-kun_?" a snakelike voice in his head whispered. Sasuke winced.

"Maybe?"

"Then maybe later," Kakashi grunted, before turning another page in his book.

"I don't remember you being _this_ lazy last time."

Kakashi looked back up from his book. "What was that?"

"Nothing," Sasuke stammered, before going back to watching the arena fight. Naruto was still sidestepping the duo of dog and boy as they spun into him in literal tornadoes of power. They left gouges in the ground around him, making the task difficult, but possible.

XxX

"When are you going to give this up?"

"Never!" shouted Kiba in response.

"You're going to get dizzy."

"Not before we beat you!" Kiba yelled back. Somehow his voice was being heard clearly through the tornado. Also through the fact that they were ricocheting off the walls of the arena.

"Are you sure?" Naruto asked. He sidestepped Akamaru's tornado once more. "You haven't hit me yet."

"Those were lucky dodges!"

Naruto counted the amount of dodges he had done since they started attacking. As he was doing so, he dodged twice more, and had to count those as well.

"All forty eight… forty nine…. Of those dodges were lucky?" Naruto asked, mid dodge. He supposed that he should be annoyed by now, but Bolt had much more bullheaded strategies and much less sense, so he was used to fighting like this.

"Y-yes," Kiba stammered. Naruto smirked. Kiba was getting dizzy.

"Oh," Naruto said. His voice was knowing, and that pissed Kiba off, which was exactly the blonde Hokage's intention. The tornadoes, which were dying down, seemed to increase in intensity.

"Alright Akamaru! Let's hit him with a pincer attack!" Kiba yelled. Naruto chuckled.

"You shouldn't discuss your plans where your enemy can hear you."

"Shut up Naruto!" Kiba yelled as he and Akamaru came from opposite sides of the blonde. Naruto looked back and forth between the two, judging the attack for what it was. To an untrained and uninformed eye, the attack would be sudden and hard to avoid. He was not untrained nor uninformed, so with practiced ease, Naruto stepped back, allowing the two to hit and knock each other out.

"Match done! Winner: Naruto Uzumaki!" the proctor, a man with what seemed to be a terminal cough announced. With a large grin, Naruto walked over to the two unconscious canines and congratulated them, before lifting them both and walking off to the infirmary.

XxX

Sasuke and, surprisingly, Sakura were unsurprised by the outcome of that fight. When Naruto arrived on the balcony they just nodded to him.

"Nice one, Naruto," Sakura said, a slight smile on her face. Sasuke mirrored the expression.

"I bet my fight is shorter."

" _You wanna know what isssn't ssshort_?"

"Shut up, Snake bastard!"

Everyone on the balcony looked at the Uchiha as if he was crazy.

"It's none of your business!"

"Is he still whispering into your ear?" Naruto asked, uncaring of who was around him.

"He is! I _told_ you he was annoying!"

"Wait, who's annoying?" Shikamaru asked. His eyes were, for once, both open and focused. Naruto, who had the great pleasure of having this man as his aid in the future, saw the look on the young genius' face many times before, and quickly deflected the dangerous situation.

"Uh, the voice of his brother, mocking him. Yeah."

Shikamaru was not convinced.

"What reason would I have to lie?"

Shikamaru looked as if he were coming up with many such reasons.

"That was a rhetorical question."

"Then why do I have answers?"

"Moving on," Naruto said, quickly guiding Sasuke to a corner of the balcony away from the rest of the children. The next match, ironically, called Shikamaru and some Sound genin to the arena. Shikamaru, before heading down the stairs, glared at the two boys.

"Troublesome," he muttered, then was gone.

Sasuke cuffed his arm around his blonde friend's head and brought him close. This brought quite a few stares his way, but they were all ignored.

"He's being annoying. Like, more annoying than he was last time."

Naruto's eyes widened. "How so? Forgive me, I'm not too well versed in the matter of _cursed_ seals."

"Oh right, you studied seals back in the future. Do you have any idea how to get rid of this one?" Sasuke bared his neck to show his best friend the cursed sigil there. The skin was red around three black teardrops that were seared into his skin. Naruto looked at it, before tentatively touching it. Sasuke hissed at the contact, but remained otherwise calm.

"Sorry, nothing doing."

"What do you _mean_ 'nothing doing'? Aren't you an Uzumaki? Don't you guys whisper to seals?"

Naruto raised an eyebrow, before stepping back and folding his arms. "First off, no. Second off, even if we did, do you really think a seal made by _Orochimaru_ would listen to whatever we said?"

"I dunno… maybe?"

" _You_ don't even listen to what I say."

"That's not the point," the Uchiha hissed. "Why, exactly, can't you get this thing off me."

"Well, to put it as simply as I can, the seal employs natural chakra and a little bit of Orochimaru's own in order to bind a specific chakra matrix to your own, letting you utilize and absorb both…"

"Wait," Sasuke interrupted, a hand to his nose to staunch the upcoming headache. "Use… smaller words. It scares me whenever you use more than one syllable to speak."

Naruto glared at him.

" **Glad I'm not the only one** ," Kyuubi said. Naruto glared at him as well.

Seeing as Kyuubi was currently inside of the blonde, this was a confusing action, but one Naruto managed to do nonetheless.

"Ignoring your rude comments… Basically Orochimaru has wrapped his soul around yours and anchored himself there with some sort of special natural chakra. Due to the nature of nature oriented chakra, I cannot remove it without destroying your own chakra system in the process. Now, if you _really_ want it gone that badly, I suppose I can, otherwise…"

"Do it," Sasuke said. His face was set in stone.

"Excuse me?"

"You can do it, so do it," the ex-Avenger said. He pulled down the collar of his shirt once more and sat on his knees, making himself comfortable for what would no doubt be an intensive procedure.

"Did you not hear what I just said about this?" Naruto gestured wildly at Sasuke's neck with both of his hands. It would be a strange sight had not everyone else be focused on what was happening down in the arena.

"I did, and I've decided the rewards are well worth the risks."

Naruto's eyes widened. "Risks? There are no _risks_. Your chakra system will be shredded beyond repair if I did this, guaranteed. It is a one hundred percent certainty, no going back."

"That's fine," Sasuke said, voice even. "I don't need chakra to be a ninja. If Lee could do it, so can I. Besides, you made it this far without a brain, how hard could being a ninja really be?"

" **He's got you there, kit.** "

"You stay out of this, fox," Naruto then turned back to his apparently insane friend. "As for you, this issue can easily be resolved with the Evil Suppression Seal until a more permanent solution is found."

"The… what?"

"The Evil Suppression Seal. It's that one where people put seals all over the room and then suck them into you."

Both children looked up to see Neji make his way over to them. Sasuke spoke up first.

"Oh right. That one." The Uchiha then shook his head. "No thanks. That one took forever and hurt like a bitch. I'd rather you just remove the Curse."

Naruto stared at his rival. "Removing it would hurt more."

"Don't care, just do it." Sasuke then turned his head, ending the conversation while also exposing the mark. Naruto sighed, before going through handseals.

"If I weren't sure time would reset I would never do this." Chakra then started to build around the young Hokage. Starting off small, the blue power roiled and twisted until it was visible to the naked eye. Moving and spinning with enough power to affect the air, everyone in the stadium had little choice but to look at the blonde boy.

"Wh-what are you doing, Naruto?" Kakashi asked, his Sharingan eye exposed. The Jonin had tried to keep track of what was happening with his transplanted eye, but the power eventually became so concentrated that it began to blind him.

"Just giving the bastard what he wants," Naruto answered. His hands had started to blur.

"And what exactly is that?" Sarutobi Hiruzen, the Third Hokage asked. He had arrived amidst a trio of ANBU.

Two of such ANBU were immediately repelled from the sheer force of the jinchuuruki's power. Sakura, who refused to be surprised by this, just watched as they tumbled to the stadium floor.

"He wants the seal gone, so I'm making it gone. He can deal with the aftermath himself."

Neji, who was so used to the antics of his time traveling partners just stared, before turning to his military leader. His face was stoic as he spoke. "It's best to just let them do this. If you don't they'll just be annoying for the next few days."

If possible, the eyes of everyone on the balcony widened even further.

"Neji…" Tenten, his female weapons specialist teammate started. She opened her mouth to say more, but the force of Naruto's chakra literally blew her away. Neji glared behind him.

"Can you restrain that? A little?"

"Nope," Naruto answered. Sasuke rustled.

"Shut the hell up, Hyuuga! I'm getting this thing off!"

Neji turned back around, eyes half lidded. "Forget it, I'm just going to wait until time resets."

The Hokage's eyebrow lifted. "Until time wha-"

And then the world went black and white. The sudden shift in reality disturbed the chakra that Naruto was building, and he was almost shocked when it all disappeared.

"And there it is," Neji commented stoically. He waved his hand in front of the confused Hokage's face, noting exactly how frozen he was. "Time has reset."

Sasuke looked up at the Hyuuga, enraged. "What the hell? He was almost done!"

Naruto raised an eyebrow. "I was nowhere near done."

"Just a few more seconds and Orochimaru would've been gone!"

Naruto's other eyebrow rose. "It would've taken a half hour more, easily."

"Now I'm stuck with this… this thing on me!"

Neji smirked. "It was probably better than the alternative."

Sasuke looked to his shoulder. Straining it, he was able to catch a glance of the Seal that was definitely still there. In true Uchiha fashion he glared at it, then glared at Neji.

"Is a broken chakra network really worth it?"

Sasuke continued glaring. Neji didn't know what to make of it.

"He means 'yes'," Naruto murmured, walking back over to Sasuke after having pulled a towel from… somewhere.

"You can interpret his glares?"

"He's glared at me _a lot_." Naruto then placed the towel, slightly wet, over Sasuke's shoulder. Sasuke visibly relaxed at the contact, though he continued to glare as an afterthought. It was much less potent, but Naruto slapped the boy in the back of the head anyway. The glare returned full power.

"What was that for?"

"You don't look right if you're not pissed off."

Of course, Sasuke's response to that was to glare. It contented Naruto.

"Anyway," Neji said, officially having enough of the bromance he was subject to, "what is the towel for?"

"Well, it has seals in it," Naruto said, pointing at the various seals scribbled across it. "They dampen the effects of any seals they encounter."

"And why would you need to do that?" Neji asked. Naruto looked at him as if he were stupid.

"Because… because Orochimaru is in there?" The blonde looked honestly surprised that _he_ had to explain something to someone else.

Neji raised an eyebrow. "Is he?"

"Well, no. Not particularly. Not anymore at least."

Sasuke's head shot up. "Who said that?"

"You know exactly who said that."

Slowly, all three boys turned to see a taller man standing behind them. His face was soft and feminine, but most of all pale. His eyes were slit, like a snake's, not that you could tell fully as one of them was hidden behind a river of long, oily black hair. He wore a modest kimono that covered the rest of his body, including both his arms and his legs.

"Y-you…"

"It seems we're in the past. I knew it felt odd when my soul appeared somewhere I couldn't recognize." The man then looked over to the onyx eyed boy on the ground. "That towel has Uzumaki restraining seals on it. I'm guessing that it's covering up my old sealing mark. Allow me to help you with that then."

The man then walked over to the Uchiha. Naruto and Neji attempted to stop him, but were immediately dispatched.

"Naruto, you've become much stronger than I can possibly hope to be, but you're not in your old body. Please don't interfere." The man then looked at Neji. "Aren't you dead?"

"Aren't you?" Neji shot back. The man chuckled. It was somehow both melodic and highly disturbing.

"I'm hard to kill."

"He really is," both Naruto and Sasuke intoned. The latter quickly shut up as the man continued his stroll towards him. The Uchiha attempted to activate his Sharingan, but a quick flick in the forehead stopped that.

"How-"

"I revived Itachi and asked him. Apparently the forehead thing deactivates the Sharingan. It puzzled the hell out of me that I couldn't tell why he did that."

Naruto shouted from where he was thrown. "Ha! I knew it didn't mean whatever bullshit you said!"

"Shut the hell up, Naruto!" Sasuke yelled. He looked back at the man. "You! What that hell do you want?"

"Why, to help you Sasuke-kun."

"Bullshit."

"Why is that?" the man asked.

"You _never_ want to help me unless it benefits you."

The man chuckled. "I can be benevolent."

"Yeah, and I can be homosexual."

Both the man and Neji looked at Naruto. Naruto, in turn, looked at himself, before looking at Sasuke.

"Dude, you walked into that one," the blonde said. Sasuke rolled his eyes.

"He doesn't count. Listen, just get what you want over with and get out of here."

The man looked around. Everyone around him was frozen in a black and white canvas.

"And where do you want me to go?" He asked. When Sasuke growled, the man just chuckled and pulled the towel off. He stared at the curse mark, before clicking his tongue in annoyance.

"I was so drab back then. This is so sloppy."

"Remove it… please?"

"Oh fine," the man drawled. He put his hand, palm covering the mark, on Sasuke's neck.

"Now you may feel a little pain…"

Sasuke didn't know what to say to that. He attempted to stop the man so he could prepare himself, but the man didn't seem too keen on that plan. He immediately channeled chakra to his hand, then pulled it back. Immediately the black chakra started to unravel, and an inky black and purple substance started to be pulled from the Uchiha.

Sasuke howled. "Orochimaruuuu!"

The Snake Sannin started laughing uncontrollably. "I _knew_ I'd get you to scream my name someday!"

Eventually the blackness was pulled completely from Sasuke. With it's removal, the cursed mark was removed from Sasuke as well. The Uchiha collapsed on the ground from the unbearable pain, while the blackness that was pulled from him roiled on the ground until it formed into the shape of a man.

And from it, another Orochimaru appeared.

"Wh-where am I?" the man hissed. "And who are…"

The new Orochimaru then noticed Sasuke on the ground. His face lit up in unrestrained glee.

"Sssasssuke-kun!" the man hissed happily. Sasuke propped himself on his elbows to see what was going on, only to regret it immediately.

"Th-there are two of you?" he stammered, before fainting.

Naruto and Neji promptly fell over laughing.

Ignoring the two boys and the world frozen around him, the man attempted to lunge himself at the unconscious Uchiha heir, only to be restrained by the man who looked suspiciously like him.

"Who are you?" the new Orochimaru finished his question from before. The first Orochimaru snickered, before removing his hand from his past self's shoulder. A seal was left there that began to glow.

"I'm you, but better," the future Orochimaru said, before cackling as his past self burst into unholy black flames. He bent down as his past self rolled on the ground in agony, unable to shed his own skin for some reason. "And trust me, you don't want _any_ part of that boy. Think of this as a mercy killing."

Eventually the screams died down as Orochimaru's past self was reduced to cinders. Orochimaru resealed the flames, then turned back to the two boys behind him who weren't unconscious. Their laughter, only slightly abated from watching the man kill his past self, stopped when the Sannin focused his attention on them.

"Now, are you going to tell me why I'm in the past?" The Snake sage asked.

"Are you going to tell me if you're Mitsuki's mom or dad?" Naruto asked imperiously, his eyebrow raised.

"Are you going to tell me how to use the Talk no Jutsu?" Orochimaru shot back, his own eyebrow raised in an amused challenge. Neji blanched.

"I don't think these secrets carry the same weight." Both of the other two conscious members of the time freeze glared at him.

"They are," they both said.

Neji promised himself to stay hands off from now on.


	16. Chapter 16: The Training Begins

_**Quickest I've ever updated. Laugh, rate and give me that wonderful feedback! For all those who've been giving me it thus far, I thank you. With that said, honorable mentions!**_

 _ **Ad Legere: Thank you for the kind words! I never know how people feel about the serious moments, and it's nice to know they're appreciated.**_

 _ **Sagar Hussein: Thanks for constantly commenting. The constant support is appreciated too.**_

 _ **Chemis3: Thank you for letting me realize I have fans from other places! Love goes out to you from the US to the Phillipines!**_

 _ **EvanescentWriter: Thank you for the review. Honestly, I feel bad when it takes long to update. I want to give you guys my best, so I often don't write when I'm not feeling good. I haven't been feeling good for a very long time. I haven't even really eaten in a while. Knowing that I have fans like you that are willing to let me give you my best, even though I'm just not at my best, makes me feel good. I really want to interact with you guys and give you my all. It's just that my all isn't very much. Thank you for waiting.**_

 _ **Schermionie: Your review was just so well written and... you know... comprehensive? In depth? It had feedback and suggestions and references to what I did right and stuff. Thanks for that. I don't know what I'm doing right or what I'm doing wrong. I want to know things like that. I want to get better. I want to be a writer that can bring amazing stories to you guys, my wonderful fans. Improving on the good parts of my story is a great start. I might even use some of your ideas. I've used a fan's ideas before. Just don't think it'll happen often. This story is pretty set out already.**_

 _ **And to everyone else that has been telling me that I've been doing wonderfully and how funny it is... I thank you. It's late right now in New York so I can't do every single person individually, just know that I'm going through the comments now and I've read and remembered all of you. Thank you for your support and have a great night. (Or day) I love you all.**_

* * *

The first thing Orochimaru noticed when he opened his eyes was that the world wasn't black and white anymore. No, instead it was black and silver, as the darkness around him lent no aid to sight save for the silver hair of his subordinate, Kabuto Yakushi.

The very same Kabuto Yakushi that Naruto and Sasuke met in the Chuunin Exams.

Orochimaru's sneer widened. He had been sneering from before he regained control of his past self, and only saw fit to do more so now. The man kneeling before him, while loyal, was an absolute madman. Kabuto was cunning and devious, and Orochimaru was sure that the man would do everything in his power to meddle in his plans, if for no other reason than to prove himself more and more useful through necessity.

The man was loyal, but only in so that being loyal was beneficial to him. However devoted Kabuto was, he was simply a pain to deal with and even harder to get rid of.

So it was with great glee that Orochimaru dispatched of him immediately. A quick swipe of Kusanagi, his famous sword, and Kabuto was beheaded before he could even react.

Kabuto's reaction to the attack was to reattach his head.

"Now, what was that for Lord Orochimaru?" the man asked, the wet " _schlop_ " sound of his skin and blood colliding filling the void of the empty, and rather dark, room.

"Uh… nothing," Orochimaru stammered, clearing not expecting that. The boys had told him that word would quickly become his response to everything, and it had seemed to be for a reason. Kabuto, the slick, inexpressive bastard that he was, seemed to take the explanation without complaint, and rose to his feet.

"I see, well then. Like I was saying before, a Konoha Jounin had overheard me and the Sand Rat talking about the plan, but he was quickly dispatched. The invasion is going along smoothly and all of our troops are preparing for the attack in a month.

"Ah… I see," Orochimaru hissed. He was uncomfortable with the proceedings, as his want to destroy his old village disappeared ages ago, but he was nothing if not a good actor.

And a confirmed shifty freak.

The Snake Sannin played his part of an overwhelming and frightening lord, and Kabuto nodded, apparently pleased with his demeanor.

"By your leave, Lord Orochimaru."

The Snake Sannin dismissed him, and Kabuto bowed deeply before leaving. As soon as the door closed, Orochimaru shuddered. There was something _not right_ with that boy.

XxX

Kakashi looked at Sasuke. The Uchiha glared back. Kakashi moved the boy's collar, only to see that the mark was gone. Sasuke continued to glare. Kakashi coughed.

"So… what happened to the-"

"I fell down some stairs," Sasuke replied, obviously not in the mood.

"I see," Kakashi mumbled. He wasn't sure how to take the obvious lie. All parties present could easily tell that it was a lie, including the Uchiha himself, but the boldness of it was so daring that he wasn't sure if he should call his student out on it. At a loss of anything else to do, he said the first thing that came to his mind. "Training?"

"Sure," Sasuke grunted, and the two disappeared.

"Well, that was a thing." Naruto's smile, while ever present, was still blinding even if he had nothing to smile about.

"Yeah," Sakura mumbled. She looked back and forth between her teammate and Neji, who decided to stick around for some reason, before nodding and proceeding to walk off.

"Where are you going?" Neji asked.

"To spy on them," the kunoichi replied without even turning around.

"Why?"

"Cause they're both hot."

Neither ninja had the proper words to respond to that. Seeing they had nothing else to say, Sakura slinked off, disappearing almost immediately. Neji turned to Naruto.

"And what about you?"

"Me?" Naruto asked. Neji rolled his eyes.

"No, the Kyuubi." Neji responded sarcastically. The Kyuubi answered anyway.

" **I'm going to go burn down the surrounding forests**." A puff of chakra later and a small three tailed fox took off through the village. "Small" was a relative term, as it was still the size of a small house, but that was a small detail.

The big detail was the horde people screaming as the Kyuubi burned the houses on his way to the forest.

"Should we be…" Neji started. Naruto held up a hand.

"Give it a minute," he said. After a minute the panicked people suddenly stopped screaming, before going back to what they were doing beforehand. "There we go."

It should be noted that the houses, while slowly going out, were still burning.

"Ah, of course. I don't know _why_ I bothered." The Hyuuga's tone was decidedly dry. He turned back to Naruto. "So, we're alone."

Naruto's eyes snapped to his Hyuuga friend. His eyes were wide as he said, "This better not be your opportunity to confess."

"What? No!" Neji sputtered. "I just wanted to ask you some stuff."

"Like what?" Naruto asked. He sat on the ground. As there were people walking in the busy village street, this was an unwise decision.

"Like how this 'time travel' stuff works. The rules seem to be switching all the time."

"I don't see what you mean."

"Well," Neji began, "Are things supposed to stay the same, or change?"

"They're supposed to stay the same." Naruto tilted his head.

"Then why are they changing?"

Naruto tilted his head even more. "Because we want them to?"

"Why?" Neji practically screamed. "These are _gods_ you're playing with! Why are you purposefully trying to make them angry?"

Naruto shrugged.

"How are you even doing this?"

"Oh, that's an easy one," Naruto said, the smile on his face replacing the confused one. "It turns out, if we annoy them enough, they'll compromise in order to push things along."

"So… the curse mark thing?"

"They're compromising."

"And the Sakura thing?"

Naruto tilted his head again. "What Sakura thing?"

"Sakura's changing too. Have you not noticed that?"

Naruto shook his head. "Not really. She just seems like herself."

"Like herself when she was this age, or like herself when she was an adult kunoichi?"

Naruto refused to answer.

"You don't think she's…"

"No," Naruto answered, conviction in his voice. His panicked expression didn't mirror the statement.

"Are you… are you okay?" Neji wasn't sure if he should be afraid, given the scared look on his friend's face.

"I sure hope we'll be."

"Wait, we?"

Naruto didn't answer. Instead, he stood up and walked off in a random direction in the village.

"Where are you going?" Neji asked. A slight panic ran up his spine at Naruto's sudden lack of answers.

"To go find Pervy Sage. I haven't seen him in forever and if Sakura really is going to be the next person to return due to our shenanigans, then I need to talk to someone who can relax _correctly_."

"Wait, then what am I going to do?" Neji reached out to stop the boy, but Naruto slipped around his grip.

"Anything you want. We are _supposed_ to do what we did last time around, but if you haven't noticed, literally none of us actually are. Have some fun. This is a vacation." And like that, Naruto disappeared.

Neji looked at the spot where his future Hokage last was, a dazed look on his face. After finally getting over the shock, Neji gathered himself and stalked off.

Maybe he should cut loose.

XxX

"No," Sasuke said, his arms folded. Eyes lidded, he glared at his teacher as he tried to teach him his one original technique.

"Why not?" Kakashi asked, the Chidori sparking in his hand. "You need your other hand to stabilize it."

"No I don't," Sasuke said. Though he wouldn't admit it, he was pouting like a child. If he could, he would activate his Sharingan just to put the man in a genjutsu that made him believe that they already did this lesson. He could totally do it, but he wouldn't be able to explain the Sharingan's full maturity.

Which would mean that time would reset. Then all of the half progress he made would be lost. So Sasuke grit his teeth and perservered.

"You do," Kakashi drawled. He sounded as if he would fall asleep from boredom. "You're new to the technique, so your chakra can flare and accidently electrocute you. Stabilize it with your other hand or we're not going any farther."

Sasuke almost scoffed. He held it in as to not offend the man with the legendary assassination technique currently active. "You already showed me how to make it. How much more do I need to know?"

"If I don't teach you how to attack with it, in the process of moving your hand, it's entirely possible for you to dislocate your own arm." Kakashi's bored voice sounded completely out of place with the severity of his own words.

"That doesn't sound too bad," Sasuke responded, his voice not nearly as sure as he intended. He had learned the jutsu so long ago, and had become so proficient with it, that he had completely forgotten about it's possible drawbacks. He wasn't so nearly in tuned with the technique as Naruto was with his Rasengan —dear Sage that boy had learned to _breathe_ with that technique— but he was skilled enough with it that turning it on was as simple as a thought for him.

So it was with that proficiency that he absolutely refused to use more than one hand for the technique. It would be downright insulting to his skill. True, it was skill he wasn't supposed to have yet, but an Uchiha's pride ran deep, damn it.

Also, it meant he would have to use his other hand, the one he _wasn't supposed to have_. So Kakashi's plan was already doomed to fail.

"Please? Just try it to start out with once?" Kakashi pleaded. Sasuke snorted.

"No."

"Then I'm not teaching you my technique," Kakashi said, a note of finality to his voice. Sasuke actually chuckled a bit. If Naruto were here, the boy would swear the world was ending.

"Oh, you mean this technique?" Sasuke asked, before holding up his hand and using the base version of the Chidori. It paled in comparison to what he would eventually make, but damn if it wasn't enough to put a shocked look on his teacher's face.

"Is… you got it on your first try?" Kakashi stammered. He obviously wasn't expecting that. Sasuke nodded, the smile on his face surely signaling some sort of apocalypse.

"It seems so."

"How does it feel?" Kakashi asked. Sasuke wasn't expecting that question. How was he to answer it? He had been using this technique for so long, it didn't really feel like anything anymore.

"I… don't know? It feels like using a jutsu." Sasuke answered. He hoped it was enough to satisfy his teacher's question. It wasn't.

"It's supposed to feel like a rush of chakra and energy," Kakashi said. His eyes were now lidded, showing how pensive his teacher suddenly was. "The Chidori is mostly unstable, so you should be feeling even a little apprehensive about holding it in your hands."

Sasuke didn't know what to say to that, so he just shrugged.

"It appears that Naruto isn't the only one on your team I should be looking out for."

Sasuke didn't like the sound of that. While he wasn't there for a lot of Team Seven's formation in this time rewind, he was still holding the same brain, even if the memories were different. He was getting the memories from before he came back in bits and pieces, and one of the things he remembered was how Kakashi treated Naruto when he was suspicious of the boy.

He did not need that kind of scrutiny. Any sort of breakthrough Kakashi, the genius that he was, made towards figuring out the time rewind they were in would immediately cause the universe to reset, and that would mean they would lose all sorts of progress.

And that would mean they would be delaying his reunion with his precious daughter.

So Sasuke did the only thing he could. He looked for a way to deflect the conversation. While he wasn't as good at sensing chakra as his rival, he could still do it. Expanding his senses, he quickly sensed a presence in the trees and pointed it out.

"Oh, hey look. Sakura is here. Do you want to teach her too?" Sasuke asked, pointing directly at where Sakura was hiding amongst the branches. Kakashi turned to her, obviously not checking the surroundings, blinded as he was at figuring out the enigma that his Uchiha student was.

"Didn't I tell you not to try to spy on us?" Kakashi asked, a hint of steel in his voice. Sakura, to her credit, merely swallowed her fear. Maybe all those interactions with high class murderers really did do her good.

"No, you didn't," Sakura nervously answered. Kakashi was prepared to call her out on her lie, before he caught himself. Technically, she wasn't lying.

"Oh," Kakashi drawled, before pulling out his book. "Well, you really shouldn't."

Neither Sasuke nor Sakura knew what to say to that.

"Why are you here?" Sasuke asked in lieu of his teacher that seemed just too nonchalant to do the honors.

"Well," Sakura started. "I figured, hey, two hot men are going to be training. Might as well watch."

Neither Sasuke nor Kakashi knew what to say to that.

XxX

"Well, that takes care of that," Naruto said, obviously pleased. He was standing on the red bridge in the village that led over a small stream. The stream was incredibly shallow, and really only useful for water walking training or letting kids play in. It was such a docile stream that parents could reliably allow toddlers to go unsupervised in it without fear of trouble. Throughout the entire history of the Hidden Leaf, there had only ever been one death related to the body of water.

And people had written it off as a bogus folktale.

" **Well, now we have another tale to add to your village's lore** ," the Kyuubi cackled. His glee was made frightening by the fact that he was currently holding Ebisu, the Jonin that was supposed to be teaching Naruto, under the peaceful stream. The man struggled, but those struggles were weakening.

"Why do I let you go on these murder sprees?" Naruto asked. The question was as blasé as one about breakfast. Combined with the fact that Naruto was simply leaning on the bridge's railing with his chin resting in the palm of one hand made the question almost rhetorical.

" **That's a good question** ," Kyuubi said. " **I should really stop them**."

The Kyuubi did not stop suffocating Ebisu.

"I fear for my mental health," Naruto said in reply. "You're a terrible influence on me." The Kyuubi barked out a laugh in response.

" **The day someone can purposefully influence you is the day I bow down to the Nibi and proclaim her my superior**."

"Speaking of that, what is the deal with you and the Two Tails?" Naruto had started to clean his nails. "You go on about her a lot." The Kyuubi seemed to ponder the answer a bit, though he switched which hand he used to hold Ebisu's head under the admittedly shallow water.

" **We have a… sordid history**."

Ebisu managed to break above the water while Kyuubi lost focus on him. "Pleh… What are you doing?"

" **Enough of that**."

Ebisu was pushed back under water.

"Sordid history how?" Naruto asked, uncaring about Ebisu's plight. He wouldn't let Kyuubi _actually_ drown the man. He just didn't want to use the Sexy Jutsu on him like he did last time. Using it for non-combat reasons felt… dirty.

" **We dated** ," Kyuubi stated. It was so blunt and quick Naruto almost missed it. Naruto had a feeling that the demon probably wouldn't have said anything about it at all, but now that he was asking knew that there was no way around it. Once Naruto wanted to know something, he would get the information out eventually.

It was a matter of _when_ , not _if_.

"You do remember that you used to be the same being… right?" Naruto was surprisingly not laughing.

" **So?** " Kyuubi had snapped back regardless. " **All of your puny existences sprouted from the same being at** _ **some**_ **point.** "

"Huh, I guess you're right." Was all Naruto said, before the two faded back into silence.

Silence that was pervaded by Ebisu's _still_ struggling flails.

"He takes a while to drown." Naruto said. The Kyuubi moaned.

" **I know! This is ridiculous!** "

"I'm going to go look for the Pervert while you're doing this. Remember. Don't eat him."

The Kyuubi just moaned again while Naruto departed. He roamed the village, eyes roving over various places and institutions that were lost to the… colorful… destructions that had come to visit upon his hometown. The eventual Hokage smiled at all the places he would come to frequent, and smiled at their resiliency.

Admittedly, he would add to their supposed resiliency in times to come, as no single town should hold so many landscape changing individuals at once, but that was neither here nor there. These institutions had somehow managed to survive their almost repeated destruction, and for that he was endlessly grateful.

Naruto was so caught up in the nostalgia that he almost missed the fact that he was passing Konoha's most famous bathhouse. It was a frequent of the kunoichi in the village who had made it to Genin but not much farther. As such the beauties there were fit, but still mundane enough to care more about cosmetics than training.

The place got lecherous peepers at least once a day, but the kunoichi there, while mediocre ninja, were still ninja. Most peepers didn't last long. Then again, most peepers weren't Jiraiya of the Sannin.

"Cha doing pervy sage?" Naruto asked. He made sure his feet were light and his voice was low as he approached his godfather. Emotion welled up inside him, but he quashed it with the same resolve he used to quash his feelings for the Third Hokage and his own future wife.

"What's it look like, kid?" Jiraiya snapped back, his voice also low. His hair, a mane of spikey white locks, bristled with his irritation, and had Naruto not known how it could be used as a weapon he would have wanted to pet it.

"It looks like you're peeping," Naruto replied. He had stopped right next to the man, and had taken in his outfit. Jiraiya, for as much of a lady's man as he was, never saw fit to change his clothes. Ever. Not even once. Truth be told, most ninjas in the village refused to change. It was sort of an unspoken rule that everyone was expected to wear the exact same thing every day without change. For Naruto it had been his orange jumpsuit, while for Sakura it was her weird red dress thing. Kakashi wore the standard Jonin flak jacket while Gai wore what was quite possibly the one thing that people feared on anywhere near a level of his Talk no Jutsu.

Honestly, Naruto believed that even if he were to die in battle, as long as Lee kept his line of clothing and student rearing capability alive, the village would remain safe regardless. There was a reason why there was only ever one "Green Beast of Konoha" and it had nothing to do with willingness. Most Genin would kill for the chance to study under the best taijutsu users in the entire world. No, it was socially (and internationally) forbidden for there to be more than one "Student of Youth" at any given time, and the vote was passed unanimously.

Naruto had never seen Gaara so vehement about something before.

Naruto smiled at the thought of his old friend, but shook his head of the memories. His godfather, in his bright red jacket and toad green shirt and pants, was talking to him.

"… and that is why you should never disturb a man when he is appreciating the female human form," Jiraiya said, a faraway look of what could only be described as extreme perversion plastered over his face. Naruto smiled at the man's antics, before sitting on the ground next to him. He planted his back against the wall and closed his eyes, breathing in deeply. The atmosphere was just too perfect.

"Uh, kid?" Jiraiya asked, effectively creeped out by the kid he knew to be his godson. He couldn't tell him that yet though. "What are you doing?"

Naruto's eyes shot open. He looked at his godfather, before chuckling softly. He rubbed the back of his neck while a sheepish smile adorned his face. "I'm just relaxing. You can continue doing what you're doing."

Jiraiya raised an eyebrow. Well, this was nothing like the loud, self-righteous kid he was told about. "Aren't you gonna yell or cause a scene about how I'm peeping?"

"Hmm? Why would I?" the blonde asked.

Jiraiya found himself at a loss. He never thought that he'd have to answer that question before.

"Would it change anything?" his godson continued. Jiraiya shook his head. "Then if it's not going to change anything, I have no reason to do it." The boy went back to relaxing. He leaned back into the hot spring wall that Jiraiya was currently peeping through via a hole. "You never know when you're gonna lose those around you. It's best to just enjoy life while you can."

Jiraiya raised an eyebrow. "Okay, I can see the logic in that. But why are you doing it… here… of all places?"

Naruto shrugged. "The company is good."

"Oh really?" Jiraiya snorted. He had went back to peeping on the hole. The girls inside were splashing each other and running around with nary a scrap of clothing on, but for once in his life they had seemed uninteresting. He had caught what his godson had said, his words and meanings disjointed just enough to not concretely give anything away, but Jiraiya was a spymaster. He could catch onto phrases and hidden meanings well enough, and he had a nagging feeling the boy knew that. He conveyed through conjecture what he couldn't through straight up words, and the Sage couldn't help but to stare at the boy once again.

Naruto was in the exact same position he was in when Jiraiya looked at him last. On the surface he seemed calm and collected, but Jiraiya wasn't the kind to look just on the surface. Since he had sat down, Naruto hadn't moved once to make himself more comfortable, instead choosing to sit impossibly still, as if even twitching would break whatever atmosphere he had found here, making it forever lost to him.

Here, among an old pervert leering at girls half his age.

"You're a weird kid," Jiraiya said. He had wanted to say more; he had wanted to ask about all those small signs that the kid had probably knowingly threw his way, but something was telling him not to. Instead, he said those words instead, hoping the boy got his meaning.

"You don't know exactly how weird I am," Naruto responded, the first bit of actual calm seeping into the kid's posture. Jiraiya smiled. If nothing else, that was an invitation for him to learn more about the kid. The invitation was roundabout, like everything else the kid had shown him, but the Sage _had_ agreed to communicating with him in that way with his last comment, so he wasn't too peeved. Content with the situation, the Toad Sage turned back to the girls in the hot spring. They were giggling over something and he wanted to find out what.

Back with Naruto, he had simply delved into his peaceful place. It was surprisingly easier with Jiraiya's perverse giggling occasionally drifting his way. Never before would the future Hokage say this, but he honestly missed the sound. When it continued long after it started, Naruto almost sighed in relief. It appeared that this time he had finally gotten his message through to Jiraiya without him prying any further.

It had only taken forty-three tries.

XxX

"Hey Gamabun-" was about as far as Naruto had gotten before the giant toad he was on quite literally roared at him. Naruto had to double check that he was in fact standing on a toad and not some canine creature.

"BRAT, WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING SUMMONING ME IN ANOTHER GODDAMN PIT?" the boss toad, Gamabunta, asked. His voice was loud enough that Naruto was certain he would cause an earthquake and destabilize the pit they were in.

By the way, they were in a ravine. Pit. Hole in the ground. Jiraiya had thrown him in there for training and Naruto had completely forgotten about that.

Mostly because he didn't want to believe it actually happened.

"What do you mean, 'again'?" Naruto asked. He had started to use chakra to stick himself to the boss toad's forehead, but the toad's natural slime destabilized whatever effort he had thought to make. Instead he just sighed and tried to balance the natural way.

"YOU KNOW EXACTLY WHAT I MEAN, YOU FUCKING RUNT." Gamabunta then shook his head, mostly to get Naruto off so he could watch the blonde fall to his death, but also to gauge something. "ALSO, WHY ARE YOU SO FUCKING SMALL?"

Realization dawned on Naruto. "Wait, are you-"

"AND WHY AREN'T YOU SUMMONING 'KICHI? AIN'T HE YOUR FAMILIAR?"

"Well, he is, but that's hardly the point. You see, Boss Toa-"

"THEN SUMMON HIM. I'M OUTTA HERE."

And just like that the boss summon was gone. Before he disappeared Naruto had dashed to the side of the ravine and stuck himself there. Weathering the smoke from the great toad's departure, Naruto made his way back up the side of the cliff.

Once he reached the top, Jiraiya made his way over to the boy. With a smile on his face, he attempted to pat the kid on the shoulder, only to be winded by a surprisingly strong punch in the gut.

Naruto, while not as proficient as Sakura, could utilize Tsunade's strength abilities as well.

"I guess I deserved that," Jiraiya wheezed. To the man's credit he recovered not long after he said that.

"Don't _ever_ throw me down a damn ravine again," Naruto growled, his eyes a slightly purple tint.

"It worked though, you summoned Gamabunta! I heard him cursing from here." Jiraiya wiggled his eyebrows, his smile back on his face He was obviously pleased with himself. Naruto was not.

"What if I didn't? Huh? Would you have jumped down and miraculously saved me?"

Jiraiya's face wasn't very comforting.

"Would you have summoned Gamabunta for me?"

Jiraiya's face was betraying his guilt.

"Would you… would you at least try? Like… anything?"

Jiraiya's face was downright mutinous.

"I hate you," Naruto muttered. The behemoth of a man snaked his arm around the blonde's shoulder.

"And to think… you're going to be spending the next month training with me!"

Naruto wondered if it was too late to go check up on Orochimaru. He turned to his mentor with an exasperated look on his face. "Hey, Pervy Sage?"

"Yeah?" Jiraiya asked. He was rubbing his stomach even though Naruto was sure the man was already better.

"What would happen if someone from… say… the past, were to use the summoning technique?"

Jiraiya raised an eyebrow. He wasn't expecting that question. "Why?"

"Just curious, is all."

"Well… if I had to guess…" Jiraiya grumbled, "due to the nature of seals and sealing energies, the person would summon a version of the creature that existed in their time. We pull summons through both space _and_ time when we summon them, after all."

"Oh," Naruto deadpanned. "How marvelous."

"Indeed." Jiraiya grumbled once more. He scowled at his pupil one last time before shrugging and going back to what he was doing.

The girlie mag wasn't going to read itself.

XxX

" **Hey Orochimaru. I'm here to check up on you.** " Kyuubi said as he took his place amongst the gory remains of Orochimaru's experiments.

"Oh, Kyuubi. It is an actual delight to see a familiar face. I hypothesized that you would return with Naruto, but I wasn't sure." Orochimaru didn't seem surprised at all by the biju's entrance of fire. He made his way over to the foxy Naruto clone and shook his hand. Neither person seemed particularly concerned that Orochimaru was covered in viscera. "Why are you a child?"

The Kyuubi huffed. " **I don't know. None of us know. It just is a thing**."

"Can't you control your form?"

" **We went over that too.** "

"And what was the conclusion that you guys reached?" Orochimaru asked. He had went back to carving up the man on the construction table.

" **We… we hadn't actually reached a conclusion**." Kyuubi said, his voice rising in octave as he realized what he was saying.

"Oh," Orochimaru said. His face was pensive as he cut into a man's chest.

The man was decidedly not happy about that.

" **I can't believe we never came to a conclusion. How had we glossed over this?** "

"Hmm," Orochimaru hummed. He nicked an artery and blood splattered on his cheek. With his unnaturally long tongue the Snake Sannin licked the gooey life substance off his face before turning to address his visitor. "Well, maybe they just assumed that they didn't have an answer? If you couldn't change your form back, then they probably couldn't either. Tell me, what did it feel like when you realized you couldn't change back?"

The Kyuubi was silent.

"You never checked to see if you could change back." The way Orochimaru said it was a confident statement.

" **It's not my fault**!" Kyuubi screamed. The man on the table winced at the sudden explosion of sound, and the Kyuubi took a moment to apologize. " **Have you ever been around the boy for extended periods of time? It's like every stupid decision he makes starts making sense!** " The Kyuubi then paused, visibly shaking before his sudden realization. " **I'm catching his stupid**."

Orochimaru hummed again. He used a bloody glove to rub his chin in contemplation. For some reason the blood that was smudging on his face didn't bother him at all. Then again, it apparently didn't bother anyone in the room.

"Oh, I know. I was in the village for a single day, and I just started dancing everywhere. Honestly I'm surprised the Leaf still stands today if Naruto has that kind of effect on people."

" **I think it's a passive effect of the Talk No Jutsu** ," Kyuubi shivered. He drew his legs up into the chair he sat in. That it was a torture chair complete with shackles and caked in blood didn't seem to matter. " **You just have to follow whatever he suggests. It starts off small, but you don't realize that you're slowly acquiescing to his demands. He says something stupid and you might even say no. After a while though… after a while you just go along with his stupidity**."

"You know, you never told me how he does that jutsu." Kyuubi glared at the mad scientist. Said mad scientist chuckled in response. "I kid, Kyuubi. I know you don't know it either."

" **No one knows it except for him. It's scary**."

"It's a good thing he's an idiot."

" **It's a great thing he's an idiot**."

"So…" Orochimaru started. "The transformation?"

" **Oh right** ," the Kyuubi said. His eyes lit up as the realization that he might be able to shapeshift again crossed his mind. Closing his eyes, the fox boy allowed his chakra to coalesce around him like wisps of bubbly red gas. It started off pretty sedated, but proceeded to spin faster and faster until the Kyuubi suddenly exploded. The force of Kyuubi utilizing his chakra created a concussive blast that splattered the viscera he was sitting in to all parts of the room, coating the walls and ceiling in red.

Somehow that tidied the place up more than it dirtied it.

"Ah yes. It used to use a great deal of concentration to shapeshift for you."

" **Shut the hell up, Snake. You're breaking my concentration**."

The Kyuubi's face scrunched up, a cute feature on Naruto's face made deadly with the Kyuubi's addition, as he attempted to use his chakra to force his will upon the world around him. As both a fox and a fragment of the chakra that once presided over the world, the Kyuubi had the ability to do manipulate his surroundings in small doses to the things directly around him. When he used his ability on himself, however, the process was laughably easy. He used to be able to shapeshift all the time with just a thought, but ever since he came back in time the act had become… difficult.

"How is it working?" Orochimaru asked. He was genuinely curious as he leaned forward over the autopsy table he was using. The man, who was definitely still conscious, looked over as well. He was distinctly less awed however, as his primary concern was his exposed chest area.

" **Better when you're not talking,** _ **Snake**_." The Kyuubi didn't look like he was having the best of times. He seemed to be struggling pretty hard against something.

"Are these… gods? Yes, are they interfering with your technique?"

" **I'm… not sure** ," Kyuubi stammered out, barely able to talk. Orochimaru was annoying him more and more as time went on, but Kyuubi knew he couldn't simply kill the man. Orochimaru had become progressively more shifty as the years went on, and as such was harder to kill than a ninja cockroach.

And those guys were really hard to kill.

The problem with this dilemma was that Orochimaru was cognizant of his difficulty to be put down as much as everyone else was. The only foreseeable way to kill the man seemed to be to Talk no Jutsu him. The problem with _that_ plan was that it allowed the use of the infernal technique.

And that was, in itself, a terrible idea.

"Can you feel a foreign influence?" Orochimaru continued to ask. Kyuubi could already feel the madman's scientific side coming out. He would be curious and inquisitive of everything until his interest and curiosity were sated, something that might take quite a while.

" **Yeah,** " Kyuubi growled. " **It's you. Talking to me. After I told you to shut the hell up!** "

"I see," Orochimaru said, his voice hinted with a tinge of mirth. He started the process of writing something down, only to realize he had both nothing to write on, and nothing to write with. Looking around, his eyes fell on the somehow still alive man in front of him. With a careless shrug, the Sannin took the scalpel he was holding and started carving his findings into the man's skin.

" **Are you… documenting this**?" Kyuubi asked. His eyes were barely open, and yet he could still tell the man was up to something he would find annoying.

"Indeed I am," Orochimaru answered.

"… **May I ask why?** " Kyuubi asked. Orochimaru smiled. He wasn't evil anymore, but the act still made all those who saw it feel greasy and wrong.

"Why yes, you may. You see, shapeshifting is the ultimate form of mastery and manipulation over the body, and thus, the mortal. If I can control my mortal self, my immortal soul would never have to die and I could finally reach that pinnacle I have been searching for my entire life."

Kyuubi bothered to open his eyes at that. " **That reminds me, why** _ **do**_ **you want to be immortal anyway?** "

"Why do you want to eat everyone?"

" **Because it's fun!** " the Kyuubi yipped, an actual smile breaking out on his face.

"Well there you go."

The Kyuubi didn't really have anything to say to that answer.

XxX

"So… are you from the future?" Tenten asked, her scroll of sealed weapons coiling around her like a very dangerous snake.

"Well, fuck," Neji cursed, annoyed but mostly exasperated as the world froze around him once more. Naruto was the first to teleport back to him.

"Neji?"

"Yeah, Naruto?" Neji already knew where his friend was going with this.

"What the fuck?" the blonde Hokage asked, pointing at Tenten. "It's not that hard. Just don't tell her we're from the future. Don't act too out of place. It's not that hard!"

"Well apparently it is!" Neji yelled, his eye twitching. "This reset is still happening and I've done this how many times now?"

"I dunno," Naruto said. He collapsed to the ground as he shrugged. I haven't been counting.

"I have," Sasuke sighed as he walked into the time frozen clearing where Team Gai was supposed to be training. "Forty-two times. Honestly. One would think you'd learn how to do this by now."

"Yeah." Neji deadpanned, not wanting to lose his cool to the Uchiha. "One would think."

"It's not even that hard. Naruto and I actually destroy stuff. The Kyuubi eats people. Orochimaru is out there and I'm pretty sure he's elbow deep in a person. And yet it's never any of us. It's always you. How are you messing up this bad?"

"No idea," Neji ground out through gritted teeth.

"It's actually pretty impressive," Orochimaru said, his voice smooth like silk and none the less creepy for it. "The first thing I did once I was active in this world was decapitate Kabuto and even _that_ wasn't enough to rewind the world. Congratulations, Hyuuga child."

Said Hyuuga child was silent. A compliment from Orochimaru was never a good thing. Rather than insult the man who was so obviously stronger than him, however, Neji chose to ignore him. It was a valid tactic for everyone else around here.

Everyone looked around for the Kyuubi, who usually arrived after Naruto. When he didn't appear, everyone looked at Naruto.

"He said he was busy with something stupid."

Everyone looked at Orochimaru.

"Why does that mean me?" the Snake scientist asked.

"Because you're the next person he goes to when he wants to do something stupid," Sasuke huffed. He made to fold his arms, an action that was implanted in his young body's muscle memory, only to realize he only acknowledged the one hand. Stuffing his right hand back in his pocket, he put his hand on his hip.

Orochimaru smiled. "Good to see my critical analysis teachings stuck with you, Sasuke-kun."

"Don't call me that. Call me that again and I'm trapping you in another dimension. One without food or water." Sasuke then thought over something. "Or air."

"Probably won't be enough to kill him," Naruto added. He had started to lie on the ground.

"I know, but it'll make me feel good to know he doesn't share a dimensional plane with me."

"You don't have your Rinnegan." Orochimaru said with a sneer.

Sasuke blanched. "I'll find a way."

"Persevering in the face of insurmountable odds?" Orochimaru asked, his sneer widening. "I've raised you well."

Sasuke almost wretched.

"Back… to topic?" Neji said, unsure. He wasn't comfortable with the focus being on him, but he wasn't comfortable with this either.

"Thank you for letting that carry out," Naruto whispered. The blonde looked truly contented.

"Ah, yes. The Kyuubi is back at my hideout. He's trying to shapeshift."

"We never did figure out if he could."

"Quite," Orochimaru hissed. He managed to be both soothing and unnerving at the same time. It was a feat that was altogether unnerving. "Also, how are you managing to mess this up? It's not very hard."

"I don't know!" Neji screamed. Even he was getting annoyed by his constant mess ups. "It just keeps happening!"

"Have you tried not telling her?"

"That's the thing," Neji said, his eye twitching. "I haven't been telling her. She's just been figuring it out! As soon as I enter the training ground she stops what she's doing and asks me if I'm from the future!"

"Maybe you look different? Like you're from the future?"

"I can't change my appearance." Neji deadpanned. It was one of the misfortunes of not really being able to change anything.

"Maybe it's your face?" Sasuke suggested. Neji stared at him, his cold, unblinking Hyuuga eyes and face chiseled out of stone not giving away a single emotion. "Maybe not."

"Did you try killing her as soon as you walked into the area?" Naruto asked. Everyone stared at him.

"Naruto. Why would that work?"

Naruto shrugged. "It's worked for me."

Sasuke, who was about to say something, stopped his train of thought. "He has a point. I've seen him kill a lot of people without repercussions."

"Now that you mention it… so have I." Orochimaru hissed. Sasuke, who was standing next to him by chance, edged away.

"I think that's more along the lines of the gods just being too exasperated with you to go through the trouble."

"See? It works!" Naruto chirped. "Just try it. Worst case scenario, they notice something is wrong and we're back here again."

"So it literally can't be any worse than what you've already been doing." Neji punched the Uchiha in the shoulder.

"Fine," Neji admitted, more just to get the two boys off his back. "I'll try it, but it won't work.

XxX

Neji walked into the training ground he usually used by Team Gai and proceeded to enter his stretches. His sensei, Gai, was off currently demolishing a different part of the area with his carbon copy student Lee.

Passively. They didn't mean to destroy everything, the nature of their training just demanded that outcome.

Halfway through his stretches his female teammate, a girl by the name of Tenten, had finished her target practice and made her way over to greet him. Upon reaching him however, she suddenly stopped, hand rubbing her chin as she contemplated him.

"So… are you from the fu-" she started to ask, before Neji swiftly tapped her heart with his Gentle Fist. The action immediately killed her. The girl collapsed to the ground, body twitching as it registered its shock.

"There, that should do it," Neji said. He folded his arms as he waited for the world around him to freeze.

He was horrified when it didn't.


	17. Chapter 17: The Advent of Revolution

_**Almost 8,000 words. Longest chapter I've ever written at once for this story. It's taken me a while to do this, but it was largely cause I didn't want to. I'll be honest with you guys, live is kinda rough for me right now. I can't really find the motivation to do anything. I finished this chapter late at night, and that was largely because I didn't have anything else to do.**_

 _ **Okay, I had other things to do, but I can't find the motivation to do it.**_

 _ **Anyway, here's the chapter. Please tell me how you think it is. The dialogue I'm having with you guys is the only thing keeping me writing.**_

 _ **Also, someone commented that it didn't make sense that Kabuto's head reattached in the last chapter. That his healing abilities don't extend that far. For that, you are correct. However, it wasn't his healing abilities that allowed him to do that. It was the gods fixing the timeline in real time. Sorry if that wasn't clear. The same things that put out fires and allow the characters to do whatever they want is the same thing that reattached Kabuto's head.**_

 _ **Anyway, enjoy. I'm going to find something to eat. I haven't eaten since yesterday. One day I'll be able to live my dream and write for money. Then I won't have that problem.**_

* * *

Blue, black, white and red eyes stared down on the still, unmoving body of the Leaf Kunoichi. Her eyes were blank, vacant and lifeless as they stared off into the horizon. Gone was the vibrancy and exuberance that Tenten once held, replaced now only by the cold, unfeeling stillness of death.

Sasuke made it about three more seconds before he turned and walked away.

"Where the hell do you think you're going?" Neji asked. His face was twisted into a snarl. The Uchiha stared back at his time traveling companion, none worse for the wear despite the hostile nature of his companion.

"Why, away from here, of course." Sasuke spoke, his voice laden with apparent superiority. "I would have thought that obvious."

Neji rose, obviously miffed at the Uchiha's words. He was soon stopped, however, as Naruto laid a hand on his shoulder. With a stern shaking of his head, Naruto waved his Hyuuga friend off. Grudgingly, Neji let Sasuke go.

"You're a prick," the Hyuuga called out, still staring at Sasuke. Said boy just smiled, before shimmering away. As soon as he was definitively gone, Neji jerked his arm away from Naruto. Glaring at the future Hokage, Neji moved back to the body of his teammate, resting her unmoving head on his lap once more. "Why did you protect him?"

Naruto chuckled. "Protect him? He's way stronger than you, you know. I was protecting _you_ from _him_."

"You should have let me slug him. At least once. He was being a dick."

"At this point, I'm pretty sure that an Uchiha's default state of being is being a dick." Naruto took Tenten's hand into his own. It was still slightly warm, proving nothing if not but the recentness of her death. "But this time, at least, he's being productive with his dick qualities."

"What do you mean?" Naruto inclined his head, gesturing to behind the boy. Neji turned, looking over to the forested area outside the clearing they were in. The grunts and explosions that signaled the two Green Beasts of Konoha's combat was ringing out from the direction. It was constant, so Neji had started to drown it out. Soon, however, an explosion louder than the previous ones rang out, and a gust of warm, dry air blew the leaves off the trees.

"What was that?" Neji asked. Naruto shook his head.

"That was Sasuke. He went off to distract the Bushy Brows."

"And the… whatever that was?"

"He likes to distract people with explosions. Lots of fire and sharp things everywhere. That should keep the Bushy Brows on their toes and _away from here_ for a bit."

"Why would you need them away from here?"

" **Isn't it obvious?** " Kyuubi asked. " **We don't want them seeing… this.** " He gestured wildly down at the dead body before them. Tenten's wide, brown eyes stared at the sky, empty and faded.

"Why not?" Neji asked. "The worst that would happen would be…" The boy trailed off. He went silent for a few seconds, eyes darting around wildly as he contemplated things. Then, without warning, the Hyuuga boy darted to his feet, turning and sprinting towards the ever increasing explosions. He made one bound, then two, before a small orange blur bowled him over. Neji tumbled on the ground a fair way before finally stopping.

"What's your problem?" he screamed at the young Hokage who shoulder checked him. Naruto shook his head.

"My problem? What's yours?"

"What do you…" Neji trailed off. "I'm going to get Gai-sensei and Lee! If they see what has happened here, they'll notice something's off and time will reset!"

Naruto's stare was hard. His eyes were focused as they bore into the Hyuuga's. So intense was his gaze that Neji had to look away. "How do you know?"

Neji turned back around. "What do you mean?"

"How do you know that it will reset time?"

"Isn't that what always happens?" Neji's voice was unsure. Naruto seemed to be going somewhere with his thoughts.

"Yes, but obviously the gods aren't being consistent with their time altering whims. Some changes to the past are being allowed, while others aren't. You said as much yourself."

Neji was silent, intent on seeing where the Hokage was going with this.

"If the gods let Tenten die, what makes you think that showing the Bushy Brows is going to change that? They obviously don't care to revive her. They don't care about the repercussions."

"We have to at least try!"

"And then they come here, shocked and angry." Naruto's eyes were full of fire, challenging the young Hyuuga to oppose him. "Then what? What's your brilliant plan, Neji?"

Neji was silent. He glared at the orange Genin in front of him, all too aware of the sudden change in demeanor despite his flared emotions. The boy was calm, but his stance was firm. He was sure of himself in a way that made him seem dependable, and Neji was forced to almost cow before him.

It wasn't always obvious, with the childlike body and immature personality, but Neji was now aware that he was in the presence of a future Hokage.

"Well?" Naruto asked again. "What then?"

"I don't have a plan," Neji mumbled. Naruto raised a golden eyebrow.

"What was that?"

"I said I don't have a plan!" Neji shouted. His fists were clenched at his sides, holding in his anger that he knew was now mostly misplaced. "I don't know what to do right now, okay? Is that what you want me to say? Is this what you want to hear?"

Naruto stared at his time traveling counterpart, eyes hard and stern, for a few more seconds, before clasping the Hyuuga on the shoulder. The action shocked the man out of most of his temper, even for a few seconds. With the following smile, calm and gentle unlike most of his smiles, Naruto effectively disarmed the seventeen year old.

"Yes," Naruto said. His voice was soft, a vast contrast to what it was before. "That's exactly what I wanted to hear. There's nothing wrong with not knowing what to do. The sooner you admit that, the sooner you can start working on a solution."

"Wait, what?" Neji asked. He was effectively confused.

"There were many times when I was clueless about what to do. Being Hokage was… a difficult start for me."

"It was?" Neji asked. He was meaning to ask some questions about the future, but life was hectic right now for his time traveling companions.

"Oh, totally," Naruto said. He sat on the grass, before gesturing Neji to take a place next to him. The Hyuuga was hesitant, but he took a seat on the surprisingly soft grass in the training ground. "Did you know I didn't even attend my inauguration?"

"What? Why?" Neji was confused, but also amused. His voice rose in octaves only someone used to talking to a Hyuuga could hear.

Naruto chuckled. "Promise you won't laugh?"

"I make no promises when you're involved. Probability and sense don't survive very long when exposed to you."

Naruto laughed at that. It was a curious thing, booming while soft, like velvet. "I suppose I deserve that. Makes sense too. On the day that I was supposed to be sworn in as Hokage, I, the strongest ninja in the Leaf Village, was taken out by my four year old daughter."

Neji, to his credit, managed to not laugh. Instead, he simply gaped. Truthfully it was a more fitting reaction.

"You were what?" Neji asked after he managed to get over his surprise.

"Yup. Hinata found me knocked out after I was crowned. Konohamaru transformed into me and took my place in the ceremony."

"But… how? I've seen you get punched through a building!"

Naruto chuckled. "You don't know your niece then."

"What… what did she do?" Neji asked. He was a little afraid to ask. His supposed niece had managed to take out a man who could casually slice mountains in two and supply power to an entire army.

An entire army that was, in fact, composed of entire armies.

Neji's sanity shivered at the thought of his beloved niece inheriting any of Naruto's qualities. It downright whimpered at the thought of her inheriting his unpredictability.

"She inherited the Byakugan," Naruto said, an act so simple it was almost nonchalant. "She used the Gentle Fist on me."

"You can force open your chakra points!" Neji screamed. "How did she manage to—"

"My dick, Neji. She used the Gentle Fist on my dick."

The clearing was silent, save for the machinations of the Kyuubi, who was still looking over Tenten with a stern eye. Though he was looking at the girl, his gaze seemed much farther off, as if he were looking at something completely different than what was in front of him.

"Why did…"

"She was aiming for Bolt."

"Why was she aiming for Bolt?"

"Don't know," Naruto said. "Don't care."

"Why did you teach her the Gentle Fist at four years old?" Neji asked. "Was she a genius or…"

"No."

"She wasn't a genius?" Neji asked, honestly curious.

"No, we didn't teach her the Gentle Fist."

The clearing was once again silent.

"What?"

"We didn't teach her the Gentle Fist."

"Then how did she use it on you?"

"Listen Neji, we don't know." Naruto growled, though there was no real anger behind it. "She just did. When we asked her about it the next week, she refused to answer us. All we know is that whatever happened to her on that day was enough to traumatize Bolt and—"

"Wait," Neji said, holding a hand up. "Why did you wait a week to ask her?"

"Because that was how long it took for me to get out of my coma."

"She put you in a coma?" Neji screamed, incredulous. "How?"

"I thought I established that I didn't know? It was better than what she did to Bolt. He was in therapy for _months_ after she was through with him."

"What the hell did she do to Bolt?"

"Neji!" Naruto growled. "We. Don't. Know. How many times do I have to say this?"

"How do you _not_ know what's happening to your own daughter?"

"None of us know what's up with Himawari! We just let her do her thing, and she doesn't murder us."

" _What_?" Neji screamed. Naruto fought the urge to cover his ears.

"I think you're making a bigger deal out of this than necessary."

"No, I think I'm making the _exact_ right amount of deal!" Neji was starting to turn a little red. "Why is my niece a murderer?"

"She's not!" Naruto said, trying to placate his time traveling partner. "She hasn't murdered anyone… yet."

"What do you mean, ' _yet_ '?"

"I don't know what Anko has her doing down in the Interrogation Department, but she assures me that Himawari has yet to take a life. By the way, did we tell you about Anko? She has changed _so_ much and—"

"Wh-why…" Neji started. It was obvious that he was starting to break down by now. "Why is Himawari in…"

"Have you ever seen Hinata angry? Like, pissed off?"

"Yeah?"

"She got that and Kurama's bloodlust."

"Oh," Neji responded. He was back to normal. "I understand now." The clearing was silent once more.

"You do realize she's going to kill all of you when you she becomes a ninja right?"

"Oh, totally," Naruto responded, without a care in the world. "That's why we're making her a ramen chef."

"Is she allowing that?"

"Neji, I don't think Himawari cares about anything as long as she's happy. That's why we buy her a sunflower every day and let her cook whatever she wants for dinner." Naruto rubbed his nose as he considered his next words. "Though, to be fair, the estimated death toll for even _that_ profession is higher than we're comfortable with."

Neji stared at his companion, completely at a loss for words.

"Are you… joking?" he finally asked. Naruto continued to stare at the sky. After a few moments, he turned to Neji and smiled a megawatt smile.

"Of course I am," the blonde Hokage said. Neji gaped once more.

"What? You were joking this whole time? About all of that?"

"Yeah!" Naruto said, his voice enthusiastic. "Mostly."

"That's great! I was… wait, mostly?"

"The point is, I distracted you from what you were concerned about."

"Wait, back up. What do you mean by 'mostly'?"

"Are you done yet, Kurama?" Naruto asked his foxy counterpart, completely ignoring Neji. Kurama snorted.

" **I was done, like, five minutes ago.** "

"Wait, done with what?"

"How's it looking?" Naruto was ignoring Neji. Kyuubi appeared to be doing the same.

" **Grandpa is coming in a bit**."

"The sage? Why is the sage coming?"

"Will he be able to do anything?" Naruto's voice was just the tiny bit hopeful. The Kyuubi shrugged.

" **I don't know. He didn't say anything other than that he was on his way.** "

"And on my way I was. What do you want, children?" The Sage, Hagoromo, asked. His tone was curt, his words listing a bit as they left his mouth. Bags hung heavily under his eyes, made all the more prominent by his chalk white skin.

"Gramps! What's going on here?" Naruto yelled. He held up Tenten's hand to indicate her lifeless form. "Why are we still here if Tenten is dead?"

Hagoromo looked at the blonde with an upturned eyebrow. "I didn't realize the life of that young girl dictated what you did. Should I call her _Lord_ Tenten now? Clearly she has more value to you than… well everything else you've encountered since we sent her back here."

The vein slowly growing on Naruto's temple was as much an indicator to his rising ire as his eerie silence, so Kurama took over the explanation. " **What the idiot meant to ask was, why are we still here, and time not reset, if a pivotal person that hadn't died before is dead now? I loathe these creatures as much as the next guy, but even I know this human child was alive**."

"Oh?" Hagoromo asked, his voice rising an octave. "Now you guys care about what happens to the timeline? When it suits you?"

"Cut the crap, Grandpa." Naruto's voice was close to a growl. "Just tell us why Tenten isn't coming back."

"The same reason why Mizuki isn't coming back. She wasn't needed."

"What do you mean? She's my friend! Of course she's needed!" Naruto was now on his feet, having flew to the position rather fast in Neji's opinion.

"And you believe that to be a good enough reason? Mizuki was your teacher. I don't see you in a huff about him."

"Mizuki was a bastard and a traitor! He deserved to die."

"Oh? And now the Great Naruto Uzumaki gets to decide who may live and who may die. Perhaps it is _you_ who I should be calling Lord now."

"What's your problem?" Naruto screamed, and it took everything Neji had to hold the boy back. Even then, the Hyuuga was sure that Naruto was letting himself be restrained.

"You are," the Sage said. He leveled a stare, nonchalant and passive, at the blonde Hokage, completely uncaring of the boy's ire. "You and your friends have been running around deliberately changing things for a while now. Do you have any idea the amount of work it takes to reset an entire universe? Energies and complex techniques you couldn't even begin to imagine need to be utilized, and I'm the one that's forced to do them. Do you have any idea how hard it is to make someone wish for more hours in a day, when that person lives in a timeless wonder zone?"

"I'll bet it's pretty damn hard," Neji said. Hagoromo nodded.

"Right, indeed. It's pretty damn hard. So the gods and I decided to come up with a pretty nifty solution. Remember when they said that they were actively going to fuck with you?"

Naruto, Neji and the fox nodded, though slowly.

"Well, we're going to implement that strategy now. We're only going to fix things that absolutely need to be fixed. For every one of your fuck ups that could reliably be ignored, we're going to let them be. Regardless of whether or not it affects you."

"But Tenten is important, damn it! She did a lot in the coming years!"

"Oh?" Hagoromo asked. "Like what?"

"She…" Naruto trailed off, mouth hanging open as he contemplated his next words.

"Naruto?" Neji asked. He was concerned about his friend. "Are you alright? Tell the Sage about Tenten's accomplishments."

"Give me a moment." Naruto's face was screwed up. He stared at the ground hard, as if it would give him the answers he sought.

"Naruto?" Neji asked again. "You can answer him… right?"

Naruto's answer was silence. He stood there, fingers cupping his chin as he contemplated something to contribute to Tenten's case. Seconds, then minutes ticked by as Naruto tried, and failed, to produce something substantial.

"Naruto?" Neji asked. His voice was pathetic, almost begging.

"I can't… I can't think of anything."

Neji was silent.

"Why not?"

"You think of something!" Naruto screamed in his defense. Neji huffed.

"Fine. She's necessary because…"

The Hyuuga boy silenced. His eyes roamed as he searched his mind for a suitable answer. Seconds, then minutes ticked by as both Hokage and Sage awaited the Hyuuga's answer. Finally, after what seemed like an hour, the Hyuuga boy spoke.

"She's really good with weapons."

"And I'm done here," Hagoromo stated, before turning. A hole in reality ripped open in front of him. Just as he was about to float through, Naruto called out to him.

"Wait! Gramps, don't you think you're being a little unfair?"

"As unfair as an entire group of people purposefully making my life hard, or as unfair as that same group of people shifting the blame of those very same actions that _makes_ my life hard onto me? Either one works. Both have been pissing me off."

Naruto blanched, his face going as white as sheet. "I didn't know you were being blamed for our actions."

"Ah, yes," Hagoromo stroked his beard. "I believe the gods summed up my involvement in your chicanery as, 'your species, your problem.'"

"Wait," Neji said, too shocked by recent revelations to remember his grief. "By that logic, aren't we their creations? Aren't we inherently their problem as well?"

Hagoromo sighed. It was a deep one, laden with the woes of a man burdened with an impossible load. "Technically, yes. Bringing that point up to them in conversation, however, doesn't have as obvious an outcome." The Sage then rubbed his temples. "The repercussions for that were monumental. Never oppose the gods, children."

Neji pointedly looked at Naruto and Kurama, then behind himself at the explosions that rang throughout the training field they were in. Somehow, the Sage's statement seemed directed at certain people more than others.

"Regardless, I'm not inclined to care about your problems, nor how fair our decision is regarding your problems. Simply put, I'm too stressed, Naruto. Our decision is final, and you have to live with it."

"I wouldn't _have_ to live with it if you let me go back to my own time." Naruto pouted like a petulant child, which, technically, he was at the moment.

"That is also a decision you have to live with." The Sage seemed to drag far too much enjoyment from that statement. He didn't outwardly show it, but his staff waved through the air in a way reminiscent to an excited puppy's tail.

" **He has a point, Naruto** ," Kurama growled. A mischievous smirk adorned his face, showing far too much teeth and more than enough foxlike canines.

Naruto caught onto his companion's tone immediately. "Yeah, I suppose you're right. It's far better if we just stay here."

"What are you two doing?" Hagoromo asked. He didn't like where this was going.

" **We're just doing what you wanted, Gramps. We're staying here.** _ **Living**_ **here. And doing what comes naturally to us when we live. May I take my leave, Naruto?** "

"You may," Naruto nodded. Before his head even fully rose again, Kyuubi was gone, vanishing in a miasma of fire and sulfur that scorched the grass where he stood.

"Where did he go?"

"Oh, you know," Naruto answered. As he finished another explosion, this time _much_ bigger than the Uchiha's, sounded from somewhere within the village. Screams of terror could be heard as the Village Hidden in the Leaves cried out as one. "Places."

"Naruto, this isn't funny. Where is he— WHY IS HE THERE?"

Indeed, Kurama was currently rampaging through the Hidden Leaf Village in his full, nine tailed glory. Houses were stomped underfoot with every step he took, and fires erupted from his mere presence.

"What is he doing?" Hagoromo cried. Kurama was doing too much. There is no way he could simply wipe the memories of the entire village. The Kyuubi Incident was too much of an impact on their lives.

"It appears he is trashing the village." Naruto eyed a house as it flew over their heads, casting a shadow over them all. It landed slightly behind them, causing a thunderous, deafening _boom_. "Yes, I'm almost certain that is what he is up to."

"Why?"

"Boys will be boys. Foxes will be foxes."

"I doubt any other foxes act like this," Neji said. He was a little shaken up by the casual way the Jinchuuriki pair discarded so many lives, but he saw their plan. It was a gamble, but there was no way for him to exactly _stop_ their gamble either, so he went along with it.

"I suppose," Naruto mused, his hand cupping his chin again. "But I can't think of any other reason why foxes went extinct."

"Foxes aren't extinct," Neji said. "They still exist."

"Oh really?" Naruto's tone was challenging, but still playful. Altogether, it was an out of place tone considering the wreckage and flames that constantly flew their way.

Seeing as they were several miles away from the village, this was more impressive than not.

"Really," Neji responded. He was grasping on to the conversation with everything he had. If he wavered, even a little, he feared he might drown in the ridiculousness of the situation. "There are tons of them out there. No reported extinctions."

"Then when was the last time you've seen a fox?"

Neji turned. His gaze fell on the several hundred foot tall monster that was currently destroying everything they loved.

"Besides him?"

"I haven't met any other foxes besides him."

"Me either. Face it, Neji, they don't exist anymore."

Neji looked like he wanted to argue, but he decided against it. The Sage was looking pretty annoyed by now, and somewhere deep down inside himself, Neji was sure this was Naruto's intention.

"Is this supposed to be proving anything?" Hagoromo said through clenched teeth. It seemed he really hated to be ignored. "Because no matter how much Kurama destroys, nothing will bring Tenten back. She wasn't necessary to your futures, so she won't be revived. We'll just reset until just after your friend murdered her."

Neji jaw tightened, and he felt the respect he had for the Sage wane, just a little. He was willing to let an innocent girl die just to prove a point to Naruto? That was an incredibly petty and childish thing to do, though he supposed that to a god, a single human life didn't mean as much as it did to them. No, the insult to everything was that Naruto was a blockhead. If he didn't want something done, then it wouldn't happen, or if it did, Naruto would simply not believe it happened out of pure spite.

Tenten's death would be for nothing.

Neji stepped forward, ready to throttle the man he revered not seconds ago when Naruto put a restraining hand on his shoulder. The Hyuuga stopped, but only for the knowledge that Naruto was truly stronger than him. The Uzumaki looked him in the eye, before smiling. So much genuine emotion was reflected in the action that even Neji was affected.

Reluctantly, he stood down.

"Yeah, gramps. You can do that," Naruto chirped. His grin was downright malicious now. Though he wouldn't show it, the Sage started to feel a bit of fear. "And it would probably hammer home the fact that Tenten wasn't coming back."

"Where are you going with this?"

"Oh, nothing, nothing." Naruto waved his hand dismissively. "It's just… I was wondering… how many 'useless lives' are you willing to give up before you have to start reviving people?"

Hagoromo's stare went from slightly fearful to shocked, then settled on enraged. "You wouldn't."

"I wouldn't?" Naruto parroted, before whistling. The tune was high pitched and shrill, and Neji almost had to cover his ears to block it out. Not a single second after he was done, however, did Sasuke land in the clearing, left hand tucked away in his pocket and right hand in a fist touching the ground. Bended knee and head bowed, Sasuke responded to his call.

"Yes, Lord Hokage?"

"Cut the shit, Sasuke," Naruto growled, the first signs of real irritation in his voice. "Apparently, gramps and his bosses don't believe us when we say that we can change landscapes. Remember what we planned to do when we first got here?"

Sasuke smiled. It was a vicious thing, promising only dark and painful things. "Destroy everything and anything we can until the very gods themselves give up."

"Yup. But, of course, I would _never_ allow you to do that, Sasuke. I'm the responsible Hokage, who must keep _all_ of his ninja in check."

"Oh no!" Sasuke cried, his hand over his heart in shock. "Whatever will I do?"

"Yeah, yeah," Naruto said, a chuckle seeping in somewhere. "That's why you're banished. War crimes. You allowed Sakura's pink hair genes to continue in another generation. Inside Sarada sleeps the genes of a fashion disaster. Ino said it herself. I'm sorry, but you're no longer a Konoha ninja."

"You can't do this!" Sasuke cried in mock horror.

"I can," Naruto responded, his face stern, though it was a quickly fading façade. "I'm Hokage. I can do what I want. Begone, Sasuke Uchiha. I don't want to see you until you're a Konoha ninja again." Naruto then tapped his chin, "although the only way that could happen is if someone somehow turned back time until before I banished you. Oh well. Give me your headband."

Sasuke, in response, tore the headband off his head and tossed it to his blonde counterpart. Naruto caught it, before staring at it. It was just a standard issue, but it was one that would survive Sasuke his entire ninja career. Seeing the metal once again pristine and without a scratch, and the cloth perfectly blue and not in tatters, was almost surreal.

"I can't believe this," Sasuke droned. The acting and pretending to show emotion had already run it's course for the Uchiha. "I'm so angry, I'm going to go on a rampage and kill everything I see."

"Well, if that's the case, then you can start that way," Naruto pointed in a general direction that led to the Land of Lightning. "Konoha is already being torn down by the fox."

"Good idea, captain! I mean— not captain!" Sasuke mock saluted Naruto, before turning in the direction Naruto indicated for him and dashing away.

"Hey, while you're at it, take out the Bushy Brows! They're gonna be a problem!" Naruto didn't get an answer, but the telltale sound of a thousand birds struggling to be released was a good indicator of the boy's response. Satisfied, Naruto turned to Hagoromo, his smug grin answered by a furious scowl on the Sage's face.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" the Sage asked. He was close to bursting, Naruto could feel it.

"I like to think of it as, 'making an investment'."

"You've sent two of the strongest creatures this world has ever known on genocidal quests! Two cities, wiped off the face of the planet just… for what? What are you trying to accomplish with this?"

Naruto yawned, stretching his arms behind his head. "Why, we're trying to prove a point to you, here, Gramps."

"And what point is that?" The Sage had his hands clenched until they were white around his staff. Naruto's earlier mirth disappeared as well. With a face chiseled from stone and a voice tempered in war the young Hokage stepped forward until he was just inches away from his ancestor. His head crested just above the Sage's folded legs as said man floated in midair.

"We're not playing by your rules, old man." Naruto's voice was hard, and cold. For the first time since they returned to the past, Neji was able to see the real scope of the man in front of him. This wasn't Naruto, the hyperactive prankster child. This was Naruto, war hero and leader of a militaristic nation of murderers and assassins. An iron will and loads of power was needed to keep such a thing in line, and Naruto had both in spades.

"We played along with your terms until now, mostly out of respect for you." Neji resisted the urge to snort as Naruto said those words while never breaking eye contact with the Sage. That either boy, Naruto or Sasuke, could regard their complete and total dismissal of the Six Paths Sage and the gods that governed even him as "respectful" was laughable. "But we did so out of benevolence, not obedience. If you want us to stay here; to play nice with all the machinations that you have planned out for us, you're going to have to make some concessions for us too. Understand?"

Hagoromo, to his credit, didn't even flinch under the blonde Hokage's ire. "And what exactly makes you think that you're in the proper position to dictate these terms? So what? You can destroy and kill and take as many lives as you want, but that means nothing in the end. It's a headache for me, but I can just reset the world, restoring their lives, over and over again." Hagoromo then stroked his beard, a condescending smile adorning his face. "You have lived one life, boy. I have lived many, and I will live many more. I have been immortal far longer than you have. You will tire of your games long before I do."

"Hmm, perhaps," Naruto mused. "But you're overlooking something. Something wholly crucial."

"And what is that?" Hagoromo asked. He leaned down from his spot in midair to come face to face, ringed eyes to blue, with Naruto. They held this stare for what seemed to be a tense eternity, until suddenly Naruto smiled.

"Well, you're forgetting three things, actually." Naruto then held up three fingers, his index, middle and thumb. Then, he put down his thumb. "One, that I am Naruto Uzumaki Namikaze, the world's most unpredictable ninja!"

Almost theatrically, Kyuubi destroyed the Hokage Mountain at the end of that declaration, adding a cinematic flair to it.

Naruto then put down his index finger. "Two, that I have a forbidden technique that I was being _really_ good about not using. It seems that you nor the gods can counteract its effects."

From behind the group, in the opposite direction of the village, distinctly _Uchiha_ like explosions rocked the very world. It wasn't visible, but the Village Hidden in the Clouds was being wiped from the map.

Finally, Naruto was on his third point, but he didn't put down his sole remaining finger, essentially flipping the Sage off. "And three, no one ever. _Ever_. Fucks with me."

And like that Hagoromo had finally had enough. Twirling his staff, the Sage abused his gifted power over reality and froze time, this time including all of the time travelers in its power. Looking at the world through his powerful, ringed eyes, the man scowled at the gray expanse he was now looking at.

"Insufferable brat. To think himself so highly as to speak like that to _me_. Perhaps he really does take after my sons." The Sage then looked around. Kurama had done an amazing job in the work that he had done. With another twirl of his staff, the Sage was directly above the Hidden Leaf. Able to fully survey the damage, he sighed, releasing all of his pent of rage.

"This is going to take me forever to fix." And that wasn't even the beginning of it. He couldn't see it, but he could feel the inconsistencies that Sasuke had wreaked by destroying the Hidden Cloud Village, and though he had much less time, the Uchiha had done just as much damage. The very thought of it increased the headache he was feeling twofold, and the Sage wished desperately for a break, or a vacation. Neither of those things were likely to be coming his way for quite some time, as the gods were slave drivers. Either way, he would have _some_ sort of break, so he used what limited freedom he had to get something he hadn't gotten in forever:

A good conversation.

"Wake up, Kurama. I'm bored. Talk to me."

Said fox yawned, a loud, earthshaking thing that it was, and casually ate the handful of ninjas he had in his hand as rich, fiery orange color returned to his fur and scarlet anger returned to his eyes. He was teeming with untold rage, but such an existence was his default state. His focus then centered on his much smaller grandpa floating above him, and the demon fox sneered.

" **Judging by the looks of things, you finally got sick of the brats and decided to just freeze everything.** " Hagoromo smirked. The Kyuubi always did have a knack for somehow figuring things out.

"Accurate, as usual. Your intelligence has always been fascinating."

The Kyuubi cackled in response. " **Yes. You know what they say about foxes. We are the most cunning of creatures.** "

"Quite," Hagoromo said. A small smile graced his lips. "It makes me wonder why you choose to act like such a simpleton when around those… mortals."

" **They're not all bad. If you reduce yourselves to their level, they're actually quite fun**." Kyuubi sat on its haunches. It scrutinized its paws for a bit, before finding them wanting. Grimacing, it set to cleaning them by licking, but soon lost interest in that as well. " **Besides, once you hang around Naruto enough, you'll find that you can't help but stoop to his level. It's practically mandatory**."

Hagoromo snorted, an act that seemed to dismiss the claim. "I don't see the hype about him. He's an outstanding individual, but that so many of you regard him with almost deific reverence is baffling."

" **Oh, I don't revere him** ," Kyuubi said, shaking his head vehemently. Hagoromo eyed the Kyuubi warily for a second, before smiling.

"Then what do you call your acquiescence to his leadership and whims?"

" **Survival instincts.** "

"What?"

" **I call it a need to survive. I've been in direct contact with Naruto for a lot longer than you have, Gramps, so I know a thing or two. I've seen this boy survive things he shouldn't, in ways that couldn't, in any probability, be possible. He's a complete monster, but not in the way you think.** "

"Then in what way?"

" **His luck, Gramps. He's lucky in ways that no one can ever predict. You may think it's nothing big. You and the gods looked over his life from outside, all at once. Like some sort of anime. We've** _ **lived**_ **his life. It's a lot worse from our point of view. So trust me when I say this, whatever you think it is that you've done to win, you haven't. Something, somewhere, is coming to turn this conflict around. And it will definitely be in his favor.** "

"Bullshit," Hagoromo cursed. He had listened quietly to his surrogate son's claims, but had enough of the ridiculousness. "He's frozen in _time_. He literally cannot do a thing to change anything until I say that he can. He's lost, this time for sure."

" **Okay Gramps. If you say so** ," the Kyuubi looked wholly unconvinced, and the Sage picked up on it.

"Why are you so loyal to his cause?" Hagoromo legitimately couldn't wrap his head around it.

" **It's not that I'm loyal, it's that statistically, I cannot afford to go against him. Isn't that why you guys brought him back in time? To make him experience his life without his luck**?" When Hagoromo confirmed this, Kyuubi continued. " **And that plan has failed horribly. Luck is the one technique that will never abandon him. Even against you. Even against your gods**."

"Then where is it now?" Hagoromo asked bitterly. His arms were folded, and he turned his back on his giant, foxy child. In the distance, his powerful eyes could see the Uzumaki still frozen where he was, defiant eyes glaring up at where the Sage was floating before time was frozen. "His luck has failed him. He is powerless before me. And to think, he went through that whole tirade of 'three things I should remember.'"

" **Oh, he told you those**?" Kyuubi asked. His ears pointed straight up in the air as his tails swished erratically behind him.

"Yes?" Hagoromo answered.

" **Then you're fucked. Just wait for it. Something ridiculously stupid is about to happen to bail him out of this situation.** "

"Wha—"

" **Do you know what that speech is?** " Kyuubi asked, a grin, small and cautious, appeared on his face. " **It's a combination technique. It fuses his 'Talk no Jutsu' with his propensity for luck. It has a higher than one hundred percent success rate. Just watch. Something stupid is coming**."

"Impossible," Hagoromo dismissed the claim immediately. "I control this world. There is nothing that can move here without my permission. Not even you could, Kurama."

" **Wait for it**."

"Wait for what?"

" **It**."

"What is 'it'?"

" **I don't know yet. But it's coming**."

"Nothing is coming! I only let you move!"

" **It doesn't care**."

"And I'm done with talking to you," Hagoromo growled. He didn't know why he thought that reviving the Kyuubi was a good idea. Twirling his staff, the Sage prepared to freeze the Kyuubi again when he heard something, a noise of some kind, echoing it's way through the silent void of the time frozen world.

"What… what is that sound?" he asked, more to himself than anything.

" **It** ," Kyuubi said, earning him a shush from his grandfather.

"Enough of that. Quiet!" Hagoromo then focused. The sound was constant, an undulating, almost satisfying thing. It was faint, but every second that passed allowed it to grow steadily louder, until it was fairly obvious what it was.

"Is that… tearing?" Hagoromo asked. Kyuubi snickered.

" **Prepare yourself**."

XxX

It was here. Back again. _Something_ or _someone_ had once more sapped the color from the world, bathing it in blacks and whites and grays. Around it, the wind stopped blowing, the sun stopped warming it's being, and the people who would either marvel or cower from it were now frozen in infuriating indifference.

For a being of constant, changing, beautiful colors and hues, such a thing was an immense affront to its existence. Whatever it was that had done this atrocity was not given permission to do so. It would rue the day that it had offended a being of this magnitude.

Whoever it was that stopped time would rue the day it wronged the Kunai.

XxX

"What… the hell… is THAT?" Hagoromo screamed in unashamed awe.

" **How the hell is that thing** _ **still**_ **flying around**?" Kyuubi asked in response. That rainbow kunai was an ever-present thing now, and it had proven to retain its throwers knack for defying the expected.

"You know what that is?" the Sage asked, his eyes wide.

" **I don't think anyone truly knows what that is. What I do know is that Naruto threw that kunai after infusing it with the power of all nine bijuu when we first got here. I don't know why it's still flying around**."

"Oh? You don't know why it's flying around?"

" **Nope** ," Kyuubi responded, carefree.

"Oh," Hagoromo said. "Do you know why IT'S SOMEHOW TEARING THE TIME STOP APART? **"**

Sure enough, the rainbow hued kunai was flying through frozen air, tearing it apart with the sound of ripping fabric. It bled rainbow gas off its blade as it flew, and behind it the time stop gray was torn apart to reveal a renewed world, functioning normally and in color once more.

" **I guess that's it, then**." Kyuubi muttered.

"Well, whatever _it_ is, I'm putting a stop to it!" Hagoromo then disappeared, teleporting directly in front of the blade. "Under my powers given to me by the gods, I command you to sto—"

The Sage was roughly tossed to the side, as if he were a piece of crumbled up paper. The kunai continued on, as if completely undeterred by the man of almost deific ability that was so rudely dismissed. With eyes it definitely did not have, the kunai saw the frozen form of Naruto glaring up at seeming nothing. On a whim, it decided that it's progenitor didn't deserve such a fate. In an explosion of power it made a beeline for the boy, stopping just short of him.

Then it rested itself in his hand, left conveniently open though he was still flipping off the Sage. Kurama, though laughing shortly before at the Sage's bad luck, immediately fell silent at the spectacle.

" **I have never been more afraid**."

Now in possession of the kunai that apparently existed outside of time, Naruto apparently gained it's capabilities. Slightly confused, he looked around himself to see that not only was the Sage not in front of him anymore, as he should have been, but that the entire world save for a straight line that led to himself was frozen in gray.

"So, the Sage had finally gotten tired of me and froze everything," Naruto mused. He then looked at the kunai, still glowing with an untold amount of energy in his hand, and smiled. "Enough of that then."

Then Naruto stabbed the ground with the kunai, releasing all of the pent of energy in it.

Then the world exploded.

XxX

One.

Then two.

Then three.

Then four.

Four seconds was all it took to notice that impossible forces had collided with each other and torn the reality of the world they had created apart. Displeased, the gods attempted to notify Hagoromo, their Sage, of the event so he could fix it. Then they realized that the last vestiges of the man was in fact _in_ that shattered world. Even more displeased, they exerted their will and put the world back together.

Though, in reality, it took them far more effort than they cared to admit.

XxX

"What… did you do?" Hagoromo asked. All he could remember was an explosion of truly overwhelming rainbow hued power before everything was pain. He suffered from it for what seemed like an eternity, before finally everything went black for him. He was an immortal, but even he could see what death was like, and honestly, he was quite content.

Then he was here, staring at the boy he was quickly coming to hate once more.

"I'm… not sure," Naruto stated. The kunai was still in his hand, but the rainbow hues bleeding off of it and the overwhelming power therein was now absent. "I kinda just went with the flow." Naruto then looked around. Color effused the world as it sprung forward in its most natural of states. "But whatever it was, it seems to have worked. Time is going again."

Ignoring the fact that this insane boy had done something that had potentially killed an immortal on what seemed to be a whim, the Sage glared at Naruto, before righting himself in the air once more. "Don't get too attached to it. Once I find my staff, I'm freezing it once more. Whatever you did with that odd blade you have there was apparently a one time thing."

Naruto chuckled, "Oh? Have fun with that. Multi Shadow Clone Jutsu!" Literally thousands of Narutos popped into existence. "While you're doing that, I'm going to be doing something too."

"And what's that?"

"I'm using Talk no Jutsu on literally everyone I meet. If you had trouble turning back time with _just_ Sasuke under its influence, wait until you have to do it with everyone in the Elemental Nations!"

Hagoromo then stared at the boy.

XxX

Neji stared at Naruto. "What did you do?"

"I'm getting that question a lot nowadays," Naruto responded. He sat with Neji in the middle of Team Gai's training ground as Tenten used the Green Beasts of Konoha as practice dummies. She never once hit them, but then again it was hard to tell if such a thing was due to her poor aim, their incredible evasion tactics, or the weapons' refusal to touch such horrid creatures. "What matters is that I got her back."

Neji grew silent. For once he agreed with his time traveling counterpart. Leaning back, the boy rested as his weight sat against his palms. Letting out a sigh, Neji closed his eyes and let the rhythmic cries of battle that Tenten shouted as she threw her wide assortment of weapons comfort him.

"By the way, the only way that Grandpa Sage could bring Tenten back was to use her future self. Have fun." Naruto then disappeared, having been a shadow clone the entire time.

"Wait, what?" he asked, before he was glomped by his female teammate.

"Neji! You're back!" Tenten squealed, joy evident in every bit of her being. Neji was caught up in her reverie, until he felt a familiar pinprick on the back of his neck. He soon lost all control of his body as it fell back.

"Did you forget that I used to coat my weapons in paralyzing poisons while you were dead, Neji?" the kunoichi asked innocently. She twirled a senbon in her fingers, probably the one she used to paralyze Neji with, around her fingers. "Oh well, it's okay. You'll get reacquainted with all of them, both my poisons and weapons, in due time. After all…"

Neji felt dread like he had never felt before pool in his stomach. Then again, it could just be Tenten as that was where she chose to straddle him.

"You're going to be feeling all of them soon," Tenten continued, "in return for the emotional abuse you caused me when you died. Prepare yourself, Neji."

As he was paralyzed from head to toe, there was no feasible way the boy could have prepared himself for this. The Hyuuga whimpered as he struggled to decide whether he was relieved his best female friend was back to life, or terrified.

"We'll start with your… little Hyuuga."

Neji decided he was terrified.


	18. Chapter 18: Calm Before the Storm

_**I UPDATED GUYS ARE YOU PROUD OF ME?**_

 _ **Don't expect another update like this for a while. I might be working over the summer... to survive.**_

 _ **If anyone wants to give me tips on how to start writing to make a living, I'm listening. I might also be working on my other projects. I've devoted a lot of time to this story because I find it generally fun to write something that doesn't take itself seriously, but I find myself wanting to write other things too. More serious things. Again, thank you for reviewing, favorite and following both me and this story. I might do shoutouts and respond to reviews next chapter, so you know. Get to it.**_

 _ **You have time. I don't know when the next update will be.**_

 _ **I love you all. We finally hit 100,000 words btw. Isn't that amazing? My first 100,000 word story! Thank you for being with me the entire way!  
**_

* * *

"This… seems like a terrible idea," Neji said as he stared at his opponent across the stadium. Said opponent just smiled, a radiant thing that seemed to be almost blinding.

"Chill out, Neji! Just think of it as a spar!" Naruto screamed. He had his hands on his hips and seemed almost nonchalant about the whole thing.

Although, to be fair, there wasn't much that Neji supposed Naruto _would_ take notice of. He had faced down demons, gods, immortals and monsters and come out on top every time. Naruto could demolish mountains and make current maps obsolete with just a passing whim. Sasuke —a legend in his own right and a man who, based on his own bragging, had eradicated an entire Hidden Village in this reset on Naruto's suggestion— even feared and deferred to this boy in front of him. No, Neji supposed that Naruto had very little to fear.

Neji, on the other hand, had a lot to fear. The third round of the Chunin Exams was a tournament styled knockout competition, and the first match had pitted the unlucky Hyuuga against such a fearsome man. While Neji knew that he wasn't supposed to win this match either way, as he had lost it the first time around, that last time Naruto was just a mediocre ninja with the only thing going for him being an insane amount of pluck.

This time around? Naruto could decapitate the entire audience with wind chakra and a thought.

"I don't suppose you could pretend to punch me and I go down, right?" Neji asked. Around this time in the past he would be spouting off some nonsense about fate and how it predicted everyone's lives, but such a thing just seemed so futile now. How could such a puny thing as fate ever possibly affect a monumental disaster like Uzumaki Naruto?

"Nah," Naruto hummed. He was rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet. "One of the things I had to agree to the Sage with in order to get Tenten back was that I would at least _try_ to keep things consistent. If it gets him off my back, who am I to argue?"

Neji sighed, such a thing was to be expected. Looking up in the stands of the arena, he could see his female teammate practically jumping out of her seat to root for him. He couldn't make out her words in the roar of the people, but a smile came to his face regardless at her enthusiasm.

That smile was immediately crushed under the fear that recently started to be associated with her. Pulling his attention away from the kunoichi, lest his knees go weak, he focused on his opponent once more. Naruto had his hands behind his head now, looking for all the world like the kid he currently was, and not the supremely powerful Hokage he was supposed to be. It was a little disconcerting.

"I want a good, clean fight," the proctor said, a man whose name escaped the Hyuuga at the moment.

"Since when did ninja fight clean?" Naruto asked, a chuckle accompanying his words. The proctor smiled.

"To be honest, we didn't even have a concept of 'dirty' fighting until recently. You wanna know what changed that?"

"Sure," Naruto said.

"A plucky little ninja created a double S class forbidden technique," the proctor said, the smile on his face truly wicked. "It can't be dodged, reversed, or resisted. It always works and currently only one ninja can use it. Truly terrifying. I wonder what kind of person could make such a horrid technique?"

Neji stared at Naruto. Naruto stared back, not looking guilty in the slightest.

"It's not my fault you guys can't handle a simple _conversation_ ," the orange boy said. The proctor sneered.

"First off, that you think that we, as trained killers from infancy, would have _any_ skill in social decorum beyond what we would need to efficiently kill someone is truly baffling. Secondly, what you do does _not_ qualify as simply 'conversation'. That you think it does says a lot about your twisted psyche."

"Huh," Naruto said. "I have trained killers criticizing my psyche. I feel that's a life milestone."

"I can feel it," the proctor said. "I can feel my sanity draining with every word I exchange with you."

"Really, it's your own fault for continuing this as long as you have."

Neji found himself slowly tuning out of the conversation. Keeping his attention on any verbal engagement involving Naruto was a battle of endurance, and Neji learned long ago that Naruto could outlast anyone and everyone.

Naruto had proven he could outlast Death itself. Now that was a harrowing thought.

So with a lazy eye Neji looked to see where the other time travelers were. Sasuke was, of course, finding a place to sulk by himself. To his dismay Sakura didn't want to let him have that right.

XxX

"I can't even stand next to you?" the pink haired girl asked. Sasuke grunted.

"No, you're creepy."

"How am I creepy, Sasuke?"

"Okay," Sasuke grunted. "Answer this honestly. Do you or do you not have a doll _somewhere_ in your house that looks suspiciously like me?"

Sakura was silent.

"And, by the way, do you not have it's features made of things that, at some point, actually came from me?"

Sakura looked away.

"I rest my case."

"You know, Sasuke, it's not polite to sneak into other people's shrines," Sakura whispered. Sasuke paled, as he had guessed all that stuff about the doll. Using all of his ninja training, he tried to sneak away while Sakura was looking elsewhere.

He did not succeed.

XxX

Looking elsewhere, Neji attempted to look for the other time travelers. Eyeing expertly over Tenten, Neji focused on Orochimaru, currently masquerading as the Kazekage.

XxX

"I'm Orochimaru," the fake Kazekage said, his words coming out through his teeth.

"You make the funniest jokes, Kazekage-dono," Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Third Hokage said. A quiet chuckle escaped the man's lips, and there was no way to describe it besides 'grandfatherly'. "But I must say, making the same joke eighty-three times in a row is making it rather stale, no?"

"It is not a _joke_ , Sarutobi-sensei. I really am your student." Orochimaru looked pained to the point of utmost aggravation.

"Oh? I must say, Kazekage-dono, that just simply cannot be the case!" Sarutobi said while rubbing his beard.

"And why not, sensei?" Orochimaru asked.

"Because Orochimaru isn't stupid enough to appear before me without some sort of trick up his sleeve. I may be old, but even that Snake bastard knows the extent of my powers. If he were you, here, in this enclosed space without any sort of backup rivaling that of the former Kages, well, to put it in the most delicate and sophisticated terms I can…"

Around now the room started to chill to an insane degree, the very air itself frosting over as unnatural shadow descended over the aged Hokage. Leaning forward slowly, Sarutobi invaded the Hidden Sand Village leader's personal space quite easily and without care, his face coming dangerously close to the other man's.

"Well, I would say that the very best lesson I ever taught my students was to truly fear what I could do to them should they betray either me or the Leaf. You, not being one of my students, don't know that lesson. But if you _were_ one of my students… I guess it would be time for another lesson, no?"

Orochimaru, as the Sand's leader, shook his head violently as repressed memories suddenly came to the forefront of his mind. All too soon he remembered why exactly he had immediately summoned two Hokages to fight this rather ancient man.

Quickly, as if it were never there, the oppressive aura that had gathered had fled the viewing balcony the two leaders were sitting in. Hiruzen was sitting comfortably in his chair, his aged back rested against the back of the cushioned chair and his eyes closed in contentment.

"Great. So now that we have established that you are, in fact, not my wayward student, shall we enjoy the proceedings?"

Orochimaru nodded vigorously, not confident in the state of his voice.

XxX

Neji wasn't too sure what had happened up there, but he knew that he probably wanted no part of it. Tuning back into the conversation happening within his earshot, Neji managed to catch onto the tail end of it.

"For the last time, no, _it doesn't make it legal if your shadow clones perform the technique_ ," the proctor said through gritted teeth. To this, Naruto just pouted, before kicking at the dirt.

"It was worth a shot…" he whispered, folding his arms like a child. Neji smirked at the older man's actions, a glimmer of hope appearing in his heart. At the end of the day Naruto, while being insanely powerful, was still just a boy at heart. The fight would be long, and no doubt painful, but at the very least Naruto wouldn't do anything drastic. He was a childish man, if nothing else, and that usually equated to some sort of mercy.

"Begin!" the proctor said, before jumping away to safety. Neji got into a fighting stance, an advanced form of the Hyuuga's Gentle Fist style that he shouldn't have known yet. Sure, he was breaking some rules, but he needed at least this much if he was going to survive the storm that was Naruto.

"Try to take it easy on me!" Neji shouted, his hope from before spreading throughout his bones. Naruto simply smiled back, his arms still folded.

"Of course, Neji! I **normally** would _never_ be serious fighting against anyone that wasn't Sasuke."

Neji smiled, relief filling his entire being. "That's great! For a second there I actually feared you were going to…"

Then dread. Then dread filled his entire being.

"What do you mean by… 'normally'?"

"Well," Naruto started. The boy started to walk around, his hand rubbing at his chin. "Normally, I would understand that there was no possible way that _anyone_ in the _entire world_ would be able to stand up to me, and I would go easy on them, using as little of my power as possible to subdue them, because it is just so easy to kill people when you can cut through them like _paper_."

Neji unconsciously stepped back. He didn't like the way this was going.

"But," the blonde continued, "Sometimes, when I'm just _so_ pissed off, I forget that my Rasengan has cut through a tree as wide as our entire village and shifted the tectonic plates beneath us resulting in earthquakes so far away from where I used it that I couldn't fathom visiting those places."

Neji leapt backwards. The situation was degrading fast. Thinking on his feet, he tried to imagine what he could have done to piss off the boy that was now slowly stalking towards him, the chakra emitting from his body so thick that it was visible even without his Byakugan active.

"Did you know I took on a team of Genin, Neji?" Naruto asked. Neji shook his head, not trusting his voice to answer for him. "Well, I did. And do you want to guess what I think is the _best_ lesson I had ever taught them?"

Neji shook his head violently. He had a feeling that he did not want to guess.

"Go on, **try**."

Well, that was a decision that was taken from him. Stammering out his reply, Neji stated that he didn't know.

"Well, I guess it can't be helped then." Naruto's voice was monotone, and there was a hint of danger there that was wholly apparent. "I would say that the very best lesson I had ever taught my students was to truly _fear_ what I could do to them if they should ever betray either me or the Leaf. Sasuke inspired it."

Up in the stands Sasuke stood behind Kakashi. He would deny it if anyone ever said he was cowering.

"You're not one of my students, Neji, but I think you'll benefit from that lesson," and with that, the blonde Hokage exploded from his position in a flurry of blue chakra. Neji had less than a second to react before he was subject to what he would refer to later on in his life as the worst experience he had ever had.

XxX

Orochimaru looked at the complete massacre that was happening below him in the arena with wide eyes. Long had it been since he had felt for another person, but the events down there made it certainly hard for him to keep that lack of empathy.

"Dear Sage," Orochimaru whispered, horror evident in his voice as it reluctantly left his mouth. "What brutality."

"Oh?" Hiruzen asked, his eyes only now leaving the spectacle before him. "I wouldn't go _that_ far. The boy still has a long way to go. He has the makings of a fine Hokage, though."

Orochimaru just gaped at his former sensei, unsure as to whether or not the old man was serious. If the gentle, almost uncaring smile he had on his face was any indicator, the old man absolutely was.

All at once, Orochimaru retracted his bitterness over not being chosen for the next Hokage.

XxX

"Naruto! You promised the Sage you would try to keep things the same!" Neji half whimpered, half cried as Naruto stalked towards him. He was currently battered into the wall of the stadium. Far more bones than he believed he started with were broken.

"Did I? I don't remember. All I remember was that you had _beaten Hinata to an inch of her life_."

Neji suddenly found out how he had pissed off Naruto.

"That… I did that to keep time the same, Naruto!"

"And I'm doing this to keep time the same as well."

"This didn't happen last time!"

"It didn't?" Naruto asked. "I don't remember."

And the punishment continued.

XxX

Sasuke, both Sharingan active, stared at the scene below him. Though the Mangekyo spun in eerie red silence, the Uchiha's stare was vacant, almost lifeless.

"That's… terrible." Sakura whispered. Sasuke shook his head.

"If you let it affect you, he'll just dominate you forever. It's best if you just don't let it get to you."

Shikamaru stared at the Uchiha, his face in shock for once. "How do you _not_ let that get to you?"

"You just don't."

"What are you talking abou-" Sasuke rounded on the boy.

"You just don't."

XxX

Down in the stadium, Neji lie in a broken, messed up heap in a crater in the floor of the stadium.

Or what once was a stadium. Right now it was more of a pock marked hell on Earth.

The proctor made his way back out onto the stadium floor, carefully stepping around fluids that he was sure could incapacitate him immediately. It had been five minutes now since the match had ended, and he had not gotten very far. Cutting his losses, he simply called the match from where he was.

"Neat," Naruto said, his hands once more on his hips. Besides a bit of goo that stained his cheeks, slashing through the horizontal lines vertically, the boy looked none worse for the wear.

"Was all this… necessary?" the proctor asked.

"Absolutely," Naruto answered. Without another word, the boy turned and walked from the stadium, expertly maneuvering around his own wonton destruction in a way that was almost elegant. Upon reaching the demolished exit, Naruto turned around, nodded, and then continued on his way as if the last five minutes hadn't happened.

"Dear Gods," Asuma whispered from his place in the stands. Beside him Tenten just laughed. She was the only person in the entire stadium able to do so, however, so her voice echoed around the entire thing unabated.

You know, besides the Hokage's laughter.

"Ahh, the good old Prank God of Konoha!" the young kunoichi bellowed. "I forgot how masterful he was! There's just something about it that far outstrips anything Bolt had ever done!"

Down in the stadium Neji simply twitched in response, though not from any sort of voluntary action. No, Neji had twitched from the itching powder currently filling every inch of his clothes and the burn marks lining everywhere not covered by said garments.

For when you upset the Prank God of Konoha, you don't get off easy.

XxX

"So… who do we root for?" Tenten asked. She sat beside Naruto and an unconscious Neji as they watched Temari and Shikamaru fight in the stadium below."

"Dunno," Naruto said. He scratched his head, a frown marring his usually excited face. "It's not nice to get between couples. Hinata told me that doing that was bad."

"Well, technically they're not a couple yet… unless…" Tenten stared harder at the two as they "fought" below. Shikamaru was currently hiding amongst the trees, trying to outsmart his better equipped opponent. "Are they back in time too?"

Naruto sighed. "No, Tenten. I told you, the only people back in time with us are Sasuke, Neji and Orochimaru."

Tenten glanced up at the viewer balcony hosting both the Hokage and the Sannin disguised as the leader of the Sand Village. "Yeah, about that, why is he here?"

"I don't know, Tenten. He's hard to get rid of."

"The Sandaime looks like he's doing a good job."

Indeed, Orochimaru appeared to be shaking in his robes.

"I'm sure it's nothing," Naruto muttered, never once even glancing up at the two "leaders." For a while after the two fell into a comfortable silence, looking out over the battle that was effectively Shikamaru toying with his future wife. After a couple minutes, however, Tenten finally spoke up.

"So… you wanna show me?"

Naruto sighed. "No, Tenten."

"Oh?" Tenten cooed. "Why not, Naru-chan?"

"You know exactly why I won't, Tenten."

Tenten started poking at the blonde powerhouse. "Come on, Naru-chan. I just wanna see what all the fuss is about!"

"No, Tenten!"

"Stop being so mean, Naru-chan!"

"I'm not being mean, I just don't want to do it!"

"Don't want to do what?" Neji asked. He squinted, fingers pinching the bridge of his nose as he attempted to staunch the headache following his monumental headache beatdown. Finally quelling the pounding in his head, the Hyuuga cautiously opened his eyes, only to see his new Top Two scariest people looking back down at him. "I'm going back to sleep."

"Oh, don't be that way, Neji! Is that anyway to treat your _best_ friend after not seeing her for so long?" The bun haired girl then pouted. "And you didn't even write."

"I was _dead_ ," Neji said. "That makes it pretty hard to write."

"Naruto died and _he_ still keeps in touch!" Tenten whined. Neji looked at the blonde boy, who smiled back at him, albeit a little forcefully.

"Naruto isn't normal."

"Well, maybe you should just stop being normal," Tenten responded, as if such a thing was a feasible answer. She folded her arms and turned her back on him as she pouted. The action would have been incredibly cute, if Neji didn't have the foreknowledge that his friend was actually in her late twenties/ early thirties.

Deciding to divert the conversation, he turned to Naruto. "You died?"

"Hmm? Oh, yeah," Naruto responded. He did it so nonchalantly that Neji wondered if anything surprised his friends anymore. "Kyuubi was drained from me during the war. It killed me. I met Grandpa Sage in limbo afterwards."

Neji wanted to ask how, oh how, Naruto was alive if he had died but thought better of it. If no one else was getting surprised by anything then he resolved not to be the only one that was.

"Ah, I see," Neji said. Naruto smiled.

"Yeah, I hear Sasuke died around the same time too. Gai-sensei died for a bit after he used the Eight Gates as well, but they all got better."

Neji, who was doing a great job of keeping his composure, guffawed. "Oh come on! Did everyone come back to life except me? I understand Sasuke, he pretty much shares the propensity for common sense that you do, but there is no way that Gai-sensei survived opening all Eight Gates! It literally breaks your body and _burns out your very soul_."

"Oh yeah," Tenten chirped. Apparently she had stopped being angry. "I heard about that. Didn't you grow his soul back?"

Neji's eyes were as wide as saucers as he looked back and forth between his two companions.

"Yeah, I did do that, didn't I?" Naruto said while scratching the back of his neck. His smile was so wide it stretched his cheeks and closed his eyes.

"Wha… how?" Neji stammered, trying to establish some sense of normalcy. For a while, the three were silent, until Naruto finally spoke up.

"You know… I don't really know."

"You don't know how you regrew someone's soul?"

"Nope!" Naruto chirped, his smile as bright as ever. "Still don't. To be honest, I kinda forgot that I could."

Neji gaped at the man he was sitting beside. Covertly, he switched seats with Tenten.

"Oh, Naru-chan! I get to sit next to you! Show me now!" Tenten was absolutely beaming as she latched onto her future Hokage, her arms locking into place around the currently much smaller boy's ribs.

Naruto's smile dimmed a bit as it became forced once more. "No, Tenten! Stop asking me!"

"Wait," Neji asked. "What is she talking about?"

"Naru-chan doesn't want to show me his special little thing~" Tenten whined. The content of the statement, along with the way she hung off of Naruto and the way she said it implied something far dirtier in nature. Instantly Neji's Byakugan activated.

"Naruto… what is she talking about?" Regardless of the downright brutal beating he just suffered, he would not tolerate infidelity from any man towards his cousin, no matter who he was. Naruto noticed the sudden hostility, and raised his hands to ward off any ill intent.

"It's not what you're thinking, Neji!" Naruto screamed. "Tenten is just being an ass. Tell him, Tenten!"

Tenten pouted, holding onto the blonde ninja for just a bit longer before ruffling his hair. She enjoyed the younger boy's grunts of indignation for a bit before releasing him, plopping back down in the seat between Neji and Naruto.

Neji, once more, covertly switched seats with her.

"You're no fun, Naruto," Tenten said, a small smile on her face. "At least you're nice and mini-sized now. You're not as cute when you're all grown up."

Naruto rolled his eyes, a more natural smile peeking through once more. "Don't get used to it. I'm still the hard assed Seventh Hokage you all fear."

Tenten put a finger to her chin, pretending to stare off into the distance while she contemplated things. "Oh? Did I fear you? I dunno. It's pretty hard to fear a man who wants me to save him from the wrath of a fifteen year old boy."

Naruto laughed. "I don't need any saving from _this_ Hyuuga. I just don't want your little boyfriend to get the wrong idea about us."

Neji blushed a little at this, but said nothing as the two continued to ignore him.

"Neji? My boyfriend?" Tenten giggled. She reached over and snagged a bit of his long, ebony locks, twirling them around her index finger. "Nah. He's too young for me now. They don't age once they die right? He's like, sixteen right now. I don't need to be dating boys."

Neji felt a bit of relief at Tenten's statement, though a hollow, empty feeling rose up from his gut to take its place.

"Though…" Tenten mused, a mischievous smile on her face. "When he grows up… maybe."

Neji felt his embarrassment return tenfold as he did an impressive rendition of his younger female cousin. Both of his time traveling compatriots shared a laugh at how red he had gotten, and Neji was forced to endure the situation as best he could.

Too bad it only got worse.

"Are we laughing at the Hyuuga? Cause I really need this right now," Sasuke said, his usual arrogant smile on his face as he landed from a high speed movement in the row of seats behind the three. He took a seat in the vacant chair, though, to be honest, he could have sat anywhere.

There was no one seated for several rows around where Naruto sat. You don't sit near someone easily able to commit that kind of brutality.

"What did he do this ti-" was all the Uchiha was able to get out before Tenten hooked her arm around the young boy's neck and pulled him into a rather vicious headlock. The raven haired boy tried to free himself, he really did, but as soon as he showed the slightest resistance he felt a prick on the nape of his neck and his entire body went slack.

To his credit, Sasuke showed no alarm at being paralyzed. "Damn it, let me go, Tenten!"

"And why should I?" the bun haired girl asked. "I've been back in the past for like, three whole days and I haven't even seen you once! How are you doing?"

"Oh, you know," Sasuke grunted. "Burning villages, killing civilians, _being paralyzed from the neck down_. The usual."

"Neat!" Tenten chirped. "Sounds like a normal Saturday night!"

"About," Sasuke admitted. Neji stared.

"Is this normal for you?"

"It's so weird seeing you guys without your wives. Am I really the only woman here?" Tenten asked. Naruto and Sasuke looked at each other, before shrugging.

"It's still up in the air on what Orochimaru is. You _could_ be the only woman here, or you could not be."

Tenten shivered. "Don't lump me in _any_ category that Snake bastard is in. I don't even want to know what he considers himself to be."

"Really?" Sasuke asked in a moment of amazing social engagement. "Not even a little bit?" Tenten looked away.

"No…"

"You're lying," Naruto said, smiling. Tenten sighed.

"I both do and I don't, okay? It's curious to me but it also disgusts me in a way that I cannot properly convey."

" **Don't worry** ," a familiar, baritone voice said. " **I understand the sentiment**."

In the row in front of the assembled time travelers a miasma of flame and foul chakra burst forth from nowhere, engulfing a single seat. Roiling and shifting, the fire, ash and smoke contorted itself to the form of a rather tall man, before cooling and showing an adult Naruto. He wore a red suit jacket, inlaid with gold buttons and black around the handcuffs and along the zipper. His pants were a nice, solitary black, meshing well with the color of his suede shoes whose laces were tipped with gold. On his head he wore a black top hat with a red Uzumaki swirl, his whole ensemble complimented by a monocle.

Sitting with one leg crossed and his arms draped over the backs of the seats next to him, the fox turned, an action that seemed rather smooth had he been in the company of anyone else. With a graceful smile, the man sneered at the kids behind him, his canines showing through the action.

" **How are you brats toda-** " was as far as he got before he was scooped into another headlock by Tenten using her free arm.

"Foxy!" the girl squealed.

" **Oh, you're back** ," Kyuubi sighed, " **Good to see you again, Tenten**."

"It's good to see you too, Foxy! How have you been?"

" **Oh, you know** ," the fox replied. " **Destroying villages, killing innocent civilians, eating people. The usual**."

"Sounds like a Wednesday night!" Tenten chirped.

" **About** ," Kyuubi admitted. He stared over at the Uchiha that was sharing his fate and noticed how the boy was limp. " **You tried to struggle, didn't you**?"

"I didn't think she had those poisons in the past."

" **Fair enough**."

"Anyway," Neji said. It appeared that he would always be the person to keep the conversation, and the sanity, on track. "What were you saying about Naruto showing you something?" Instantly both headlocked boys' eyes widened, and despite their predicaments tried to escape. Somehow, without using her hands, the weapons mistress pricked the two boys with poison and ended their futile attempts at escape.

"You're crazy, woman!" Sasuke screamed. "Why are you still trying to get him to show you that?"

Tenten looked at the Uchiha as if he were stupid. "Cause it's fun? It looked fun."

" **You enjoy playing with fire, don't you girl?** " the Kyuubi asked.

"And knives. Fire and sharp things are my favorites. Though, to be fair, it's the same for the both of you as well." Sasuke and Kyuubi had the decency to look even slightly ashamed.

"Wait, I don't understand. What is she talking about?"

Sasuke grunted. "Tenten wants to see something of which she has no comprehension."

"You make it sound so much more terrible than it is," Tenten pouted.

"Yeah!" Naruto said. "It's not that bad!"

" **It is** ," Kyuubi said, " **It's the worst thing ever and she's crazy for wanting to see it**."

"Wait," Neji said. "From the way you guys are talking, it sounds like she wants to see…"

"Yup!" Tenten chirped. "I wanna see the Talk no Jutsu!"

Neji stared at her. He stared at the woman and knew, finally, for the first time what true insanity was like.

" **Dear Gods** ," Kyuubi muttered. " **Why do all of you boys get attached to the crazies**?"

"Hey, Hinata's not that bad!" Naruto defended his wife, even though he knew that even now his future wife was probably stalking him.

"I didn't know how crazy Sakura was until recently," Sasuke said. He looked up at his own future wife sitting with her family some rows away. She was staring intensely at the match but, as if feeling his gaze, looked away to meet his eyes. They locked gazes for what seemed like an eternity to Sasuke, before the pink haired girl smiled, before waving slightly. Overall, she seemed impossibly adorable.

And nothing at all like the girl who owned a secret shrine in her home dedicated to him.

"I… I didn't know…" the boy whimpered. Tenten patted his head through the headlock… somehow.

"I didn't know Tenten was crazy at all…" Neji defended himself, before realizing what he had said. He turned red once more as all those in earshot shot a knowing grin his way.

Tenten's eyebrow raised. "And is that a problem, Neji?"

Neji, to his credit, didn't back down. "Surprisingly… no."

"Good," Tenten smiled. "Cause it only gets worse from here."

"Does that insanity translate to the bedroom?" Neji asked, the words coming out before he could stop them. All those in attendance stared at the boy, before the once girl laughed uproariously.

"Oh, you are gonna be _fun_. I missed you Neji." Neji smiled.

"I missed you too, Tenten."

XxX

Feathers fell upon the stadium, covering both the audience and the arena in a genjutsu meant to induce sleep. One by one both ninjas and civilians fell to the advanced technique, with only the hardiest and most experienced of warriors maintaining consciousness.

This, of course, included the six time traveling ninja.

"Oh, this already?" Sasuke asked. A smirk adorned his face as he deactivated the Chidori that was blazing in his palm. "I wanted to have a little more fun with you, Sand Rat."

Said "sand rat" just scowled at the raven haired boy. He had been beaten around mercilessly, even more mercilessly than that time he fought that weird spandex wearing kid. How badly did Gaara want to release his mother here and now, and lay waste to the fool who dared to hurt him.

But not now. It was not time yet. He relented when his so called siblings came to retrieve him.

"It's time to go, Gaara!" Temari yelled to her youngest brother. Gaara paid her no heed, instead choosing to stare down the boy who had harmed him. Said boy simply stared back, that same infuriating smile on his face that haunted him during their entire fight plastered on his face.

"I will be back for you. Mother will taste your blood," Gaara said, his voice low and dangerous.

"Please, jinchuuruki," Sasuke replied. "I have faced true demons, and your little sand puppy is far too small to scare me anymore. Lick your wounds," he said while placing his other hand in his pocket. "For no matter how bad you think I am…"

Sasuke looked up in the stands. Naruto had made a beeline for Tenten, taking out every ninja in his path be they friend or foe. He did so without a second thought, and seemingly without effort.

"… there is something much worse coming for you."

Gaara stared at the boy some more, trying to understand what the boy in front of him was trying to say. The Uchiha didn't seem like the type of person to admit anyone his equal, let alone his better. Relishing the thought of someone even _stronger_ than the Uchiha to feed to his mother, Gaara simply smiled as he let his siblings drag him away. Sasuke stared at the trio as they fled the quickly forming battlefield that was once a stadium, before rushing to his future wife's side.

"She may be insane, but she makes a wonderful heir."

He wouldn't admit, even out loud, that he still found that he loved her.

XxX

"Get him, Hokages! Keep him away from me!" Orochimaru shouted, summoning the first two Hokages almost as soon as the barrier came up. Sarutobi did not look impressed.

"I see you need remedial lessons, my foolish student," the old man grunted. Orochimaru whimpered.

XxX

"Get fucked, you Sand and Sound fucks!" Tenten shouted. She opened two scrolls…

And a literal ocean of weaponry flooded out from them.

"Ahahahaahahahahahahaa!" Tenten cackled. She had buried both friend and foe underneath her onslaught.

"Where did you even get all of those weapons?" Naruto asked. He landed next to her before she unleashed spikey, pointy hell on those below her.

"I brought it from the past with me!" the weapons mistress chirped.

"You can't bring anything from the past," Naruto said, tilting his head.

"Ah," was Tenten's sole response. The two then watched in silence as still more weapons came spewing out of the two scrolls. Those who weren't dead from Tenten's initial onslaught would find death hurtling their way now.

"So anyway," Naruto continued, completely ignoring the impossible thing that Tenten was currently doing. "I need you to look at something for me."

"What is it, Naru-kun?" Tenten asked. She tilted her head when Naruto pulled out a kunai, a rather dull one at that, from his pocket. "What's this?"

"A special thing," Naruto said. "I need you to look it over for me."

"What's so special about it?" Tenten asked. She reached out to retrieve the weapon from her future leader. "It looks like a normal knife to m-" Tenten stared at the kunai she let fall to the floor almost as soon as it touched her skin.

"I'm not touching that. What the _hell_ is that?"

"I'm… not too sure," Naruto admitted. "But you are going to help me forge it back to its former glory."

"Naruto," Tenten whispered. "What… is that?"

"I don't know," Naruto repeated. He too looked down at the kunai that lay on the floor between them, although his face was much fonder as he did so. "But I do know that me and the guys agreed on what to call it."

"And what is that?" Tenten asked. She was a little creeped out as Naruto leaned forward, as if the name itself was something to be kept secret.

"The Kunai," Naruto whispered once he was close enough. All at once the skies darkened, and thunder boomed overhead to herald the naming of the one weapon that should never have been given such a thing.

Tenten, however, just looked at Naruto incredulously, before breaking out into laughter, regardless of the ominous weather that miraculously happened.

"How original."


	19. Chapter 19: The End in Sight

_**Alright guys. I know it's been a while, but I've come bearing news. Let's handle this one in parts.**_

 _ **Part One: I promised it, so here it is. Shoutouts to my reviewers:**_

 _ **Moo  
Plasma Dragon 312  
ivanganev1992  
blackswordsman2477  
Cevandri  
Tensa Kyuubi  
Kronus18  
LolieG  
Envoy of the White Moon**_

 _ **fox tamer 113  
KimranReech  
YuukiAsuna-Chan  
Bilgamesh  
tanithlipskyBughaw  
Lightningblade49  
InArduisFidelis-RAMC  
Wallumb  
MaltedMalteser**_

 _ **And all of the Guests, I thank you for your reviews. Honestly, all the requests to come back and continue this might have been the only reason I actually did. Yes, I did write all of your names out individually instead of copy pasting them, and yes I did do it in my one day off in what feels like months.**_

 _ **Now, on to the special mentions:**_

 _ **sagar hussain: You really don't write anything other than "Awesome chapter" each time, but you've been doing it since chapter one. Constant, every time, on every chapter without pause. Thank you for your support. It's not a lot, and I don't know what I'm doing right or wrong, but a Day One fan is still someone to be appreciated. Thank you.**_

 _ **Zigmas: You're more recent, but your comments are usually fun to read, and you do comment often. Thank you too! Mwahaha!**_

 _ **era-romance: Thank you! I don't think I'm going to end the fanfic here... but you make a good point...**_

 _ **EvanescentWriter: I just love reading your comments. You make me feel super special and happy, so it is with that in mind that I'm sorry about what's coming next.**_

 _ **Part Two: I have to come clean about something. I'm exhausted. I actually haven't had much time off in a very long time, and I'm not even in school anymore. I have to work to support things now, and I barely have time to myself. And it is for this reason that...**_

 _ **Part 3: The next chapter will be the last chapter. I'm just too tired to come up with anything good, and I feel like my writing is suffering because of it. I love this story and I want it to go somewhere, but I just can't get it to be where I want it to be. You guys don't deserve that. You don't deserve to wait for months on end for sub-par work. I don't mean for it to be like it is, but it is.**_

 _ **For all of you that followed me until this point, I'm so thankful. If this and the next chapter gets reviews that are positive, I'll try the rest of the story in a different story.**_

 _ **Which is why I need you guys to be honest. I don't want to give you a story that is half polished.**_

 _ **But uh, good news. I've been writing and trying this chapter for a long time. A lot of things went in and out of the blender. So uh, there are Extras at the end! Thing of them as "what could have been(s)"**_

 _ **Have fun! And again, thank you. I may have other chapters of other things coming out soon, but those are just empty thoughts I don't have to think about. Also, last chapter might be out really soon, at least for me.**_

* * *

Sasuke landed, his kunai crackling with unspent electricity in his hand. Before him, a loud _thump_ could be heard as several hundred pounds of sand fell to the ground— it was lifeless now that it was cut off from it's controller.

Gaara hissed as his arm of sand was hacked off. Now partially transformed, half of his body was encased in the sediments. Overlaid with black and blue symbols, the red haired boy's partially transformed state served as his penultimate trump card, and was meant to be able to take down almost any threat.

Any threat, of course, did not include Sasuke Uchiha.

"How," Gaara snarled. His eyes, one teal and one sandy gold, were as hot as a desert's heat as he stared down his opponent. "How are you so strong? What manner of being proves your existence?"

Sasuke, not expecting the question, lifted his eyebrow. "Excuse me?"

"How are you so strong!" Gaara screamed, unable to deal with being ignored. He wasn't used to the apathy the Uchiha was showing him. He was used to being _feared_.

"Well…" Sasuke started, sheathing his blade. It was obvious that a weapon was overkill in this matchup. "For starters, I did one hundred pushups, sit-ups, and lunges every day for two years…"

Sasuke immediately had to jump in order to avoid the sand wave that shot his way. It eroded the ground where he was standing, the pressure propelling the wave enough to leave a gouge in the dirt.

Landing on a tree branch some distance away, Sasuke grunted at the Sand ninja. "Well, that's just rude."

"Quit messing with me, Uchiha!" Gaara screamed. "I want to know how you're so strong!"

"Do you really want to know?" Sasuke asked. Gaara nodded vehemently. Jumping back to the ground, Sasuke made his way back over to the unstable jinchuuriki. Leaning in close, an act that any onlooker not acquainted with the boy would call suicidal, Sasuke whispered into the boy's ear.

"Lots of juice."

Sasuke laughed as he was forced to jump away once more.

XxX

Kankuro stared down the bug boy before him, an impressively smug smirk on his face.

"You're going down. No tree hugger is going to beat me!" he yelled. With a twitch of his fingers his puppets, Karasu and Crow, emerged from the foliage around them, clacking and clicking as their robotic parts moved erratically. Shino, his face mostly hidden by the overly large hem of his jacket and pitch black sunglasses, seemed to be staring at his foe, devoid of emotion or want.

Though, he could also be staring completely past the Sand ninja and not paying any attention at all. It was hard to tell with an Aburame.

"Nothing to say?" Kankuro asked, his smirk widening. "Have I scared you so badly that you've already given up?"

Again, Shino said nothing to the verbal taunts, instead opting to stand impassively and watch as things turned out.

"Well," Kankuro started, his voice not as confident as before. The boy was unnerving, and that sentiment came from a person who used mechanized dolls as weapons. "If you're not gonna say anything, I think I'll just take care of you myself!" And with a flick of his wrist his doll weapons sprung forth, as though carried by invisible strings. They made it pretty far, to be honest. Blades splayed out before them, they came mere inches from skewering the bug child before losing all momentum and falling to the forest floor below.

"What?" Kankuro asked, surprised. Shino, who had by this point remained completely silent, decided now was his time to speak.

"You've already lost," were his only words. Kankuro only had a moment to dissect them before a cloud of tiny black bugs swallowed him. His screams lasted but a few seconds before the insects drained him of his chakra completely. Having had their lunch, they receded from their prey before flowing like a large, creepy river into the arms of Shino's outstretched coat.

Once they were reclaimed, Shino simply adjusted his glasses.

"Need more," were his only words to assess his rather cannibalistic deconstruction of his enemy. Looking around for the nearest chakra source, he sensed an enormous one in the direction his fellow Leaf ninja fled to.

His bugs warned him away from that source, as it seemed to taste decidedly… _insane_.

Turning, Shino sensed another source of chakra barreling his way at high speeds. This one was more familiar, seeming to belong to another one of his fellow Leaf ninja. Bright, burning, and full of energy, Naruto Uzumaki's chakra was as visible as a sun.

His bugs also warned him away from that source, as it seemed to taste decidedly… _insane_.

So, obviously, the only course of action available to the boy was to go join in the war efforts. Because a full scale war was probably the safest of the three bets.

Shino wouldn't know it, but he had made the best possible choice.

XxX

Tenten stared at the giant purple barrier that encased the Third Hokage and Orochimaru in what was no doubt an epic brawl. Translucent and almost ethereal, the barrier roiled as if it were made of glass and inlaid with gas. A thing of beauty, Tenten almost felt bad at her need to tear the thing down.

Then she remembered it was a barrier created by Orochimaru, and suddenly all of her reservations had fled.

"Time to get to work," she sighed. Pulling out a scroll, Tenten reared back, before using all of her strength to toss the rolled up parchment into the air. In response to a hand sign, the scroll unfurled, showing an intricate array of seals and designs…

That promptly exploded, showering the barrier with countless projectiles. The ANBU that stood outside the barrier recoiled in shock, their emotions apparent on their faces, even through their full face mask somehow.

"What… how?" a cat masked ANBU intelligently asked, breaking the façade of stoic-ness that they were known for. Tenten turned to said ANBU and smiled, putting up a peace sign.

"Honestly? I'm really not quite sure. I'd never had that many weapons when I was this age."

"What?" a different ANBU asked, as apparently they only had enough time between them for one person to be out of shock at a time. An endless downpour of metal was still falling from the tiny scroll, making a veritable curtain of death above the barrier as thick as the purple construct was wide. Hammering into the top of it, the hail of weapons contacted the barrier, and then disintegrated, before making way for the weapons just behind them.

"Hmm? What did you say?" Tenten asked, barely breaking eye contact with her beautiful technique. Really, there was nothing that excited her more than seeing weapons fly. It was really such a shame that the barrier destroyed them as soon as they hit. Any weapon, no matter how unremarkable, deserved a chance to be used.

Tenten then shrugged. Oh well, at least she had no idea where these weapons came from.

"Guh," another ANBU sputtered. Apparently they were too mesmerized by her display to really care about her lackadaisical response to their question. Tenten smiled. Everything was going to plan.

"Hey! Fucker!" a loud, and rather obnoxious voice called out. Initially Tenten ignored it, but after a couple of seconds of being addressed as a rather colorful amount of swears, Tenten finally gave in.

"What?" Tenten asked. The voice seemed to be coming from inside the barrier, so that is where she looked. For a while, she saw nothing. Then the cursing continued.

"I'm over here, you bun-haired bimbo!" a girl called from one of the corners of the barrier. Arms outstretched and palms facing outwards, the kunoichi appeared to be supplying the purple construct with chakra. Overall, she looked rather tomboyish, if not exceedingly young. Her glare, however, was completely matured. "If it's not too much trouble, would you mind fucking off?"

Tenten tilted her head. "Well, you're a delightful one."

"Oh really? Huh?" the redhead asked. The sneer on her face actually hurt Tenten physically. "Well, I'll be certain to forward that to our HR department."

"You have an HR department?" Tenten asked. "We don't even have an HR department."

"Oh, yeah!" the kunoichi said, drawing out her words. "Expansive thing really. It's a shame their responses are always the same."

"And what are their responses?"

"Well, usually it consists of the phrases 'go fuck' and 'yourself'! KNOCK IT OFF YOU LEAF BIMBO!"

Tenten, in response, simply stared at the girl. The girl too, was surrounded in the purple glassy mist of the barrier, so Tenten doubted that she could just hurt the girl. That didn't mean she couldn't try though.

"Hey! What the fuck are you doing?" the girl asked. The part of the barrier that surrounded her had pinged, but soon returned to normal. Tenten shrugged while carelessly tossing the mace she was holding up and down in the air.

"What's it look like? I'm throwing stuff at you."

"No shit, Sherlock!" the girl snarled. "Why?"

"Cause it's fun?" Tenten asked.

"It's stupid! Like you! That don't do shit to this barri- GAH! STOP IT YOU LEAF BIMBO!" Tenten had thrown the mace at the girl while she was talking. It was sudden and unexpected, but like the girl said, completely ineffectual.

"First off," Tenten started, pulling another weapon from… somewhere. This time it was a scythe. "My name isn't 'Leaf bimbo' or 'bun haired bimbo' or any variation of the word. I'm Tenten, and I'm the future weapon mistress of Konoha."

"Oh yeah? Well I'm Tayuya, the future mistress of sticking my flute up your FUCK!" Tenten had thrown the scythe, hitting the barrier suddenly. Tayuya didn't even see the weapon fly through the air. One second it was in the bun haired girl's hands, and in the next her barrier was pinging and distorting, a clear sign of a massive impact to the thing.

"Bad Sound Ninja. I know you're not very smart, but you're going to have to work with me here!" Tenten's voice was almost a coo: soft and slow and like one would use when talking to a baby. "Now, say it with me. Tenten. It's not hard."

"Go fuck your-" Tenten grimaced as two pings went off, one on either side of her. "Would you _stop that_? It's pissing me off!"

"Say my name then," Tenten cooed. "I know you can."

"You'll be the first to die," Tayuya snarled, before pings blared around her.

XxX

Sakura had been having a weird day.

Well, a weird couple of months, really.

But when things _this_ weird start happening to you all at once, you tend to allow the time in between the weird occurrences to just blur together. So really, for her, this was all just a really, really long day.

And it culminated in a gigantic sand rat over three times the size of her house staring down at her.

" **I'M GONNA FUCK YOU ALL!** " the giant sand rat screamed. Sasuke, _her_ Sasuke, just stared up at it as if it were a bird. Or a leaf. Something inconsequential.

"I somehow doubt that you meant, ' _fuck us all_ _ **up**_ '" her Sasuke drawled, sounding every bit as bored as he looked. The sneer the giant sand rat sent her way seemed to confirm his suspicions. "Glorious. And how exactly are you going to do that?"

" **WITH MY GIANT SAND DICK!** " the creature roared. Sakura could see no such appendage on it, but decided that discretion was the better part of valor.

"I think that it's a little big," Sasuke said, apparently not fussed by the conversation he was having. "Why don't we start a little smaller? That might kill us."

" **THAT'S THE ENTIRE POINT!** " the sand creature roared.

"Lovely," Sasuke drawled. He was paying attention to his nails now. More specifically, he was paying attention to the nails on his _right_ hand and only his right hand. He had taken to stuffing his other hand in his pocket and all but ignoring it, as if its very existence somehow insulted him.

Speaking of which, that wasn't the weirdest thing about him either. Sasuke had also taken to using techniques she was almost sure he didn't know. From terrifying, unholy black fire, to surges of encompassing, blinding electricity, the Uchiha was an elemental powerhouse with no signs of slowing down. If anything, he seemed to be getting _stronger_ with every passing day, to the point that Sakura was sure that the only thing keeping him back from challenging Kakashi was _Naruto_ of all people.

And that Sasuke deferred to Naruto of all people was another terrifying thing.

Really, the amount of _terrifying_ things happening to her was way more prevalent than the amount of weird things happening to her, and that in itself was terrifying. In the last three months Sakura had faced down no less than three S-class psychopaths, trained with two _other_ psychopaths she had called her teammates (one of which was in a coma for some time for some reason), and been in the center of more hypercharged explosions than some war veterans.

And now she was here, pinned to a tree, and watching as her coma recovered psychopath love interest stared down one of the nine most terrifying things to ever grace their world as if it were a worm. Said "worm" was doing its best to follow through on sodomizing them with an appendage it did not have.

Sakura didn't even note the gigantic wave of sand as it rushed its way towards her. She simply closed her eyes and let the light breeze float over her. She didn't need to see in order to know that Sasuke had cut the sand with a lightning covered hand.

Even if her eyes were open she wouldn't have seen him do it. He was simply that fast.

Speaking of which, _he was simply that fast_.

Seriously, how the hell had he gotten so much stronger without her realizing it? Sure, he was always stronger than her by some margin back in the academy, but it was a gap she was aware of. Now, he was so far ahead of her that Sakura couldn't even fathom the distance between their skill levels.

The boy had been in a _freaking_ _coma_ the instant they left the academy. He didn't have the time to reach that level of strength without her knowledge.

And trust her, nothing Sasuke ever did escaped her knowledge. Nothing.

Watching Sasuke's subconscious shiver brought a shameful glee to Sakura's heart, which was good, cause the sand was squeezing that part of her anatomy rather hard into the tree.

Speaking of…

"Not that I'm not…" Sakura was forced to stop here as Sasuke had shot a fireball bigger than the hulking sand monster at said sand monster, "… positively wooed at your attempts at protecting me, but…"

She stopped again as lightning fused sand into glass and the One Tailed Beast's arm fell to the ground, sending tons of dust, dirt, sand and debris everywhere. The ground shook with the impact of the appendage, and the skies themselves parted with the pained howls of the great beast.

Sasuke looked slightly less bored.

"… would you mind, uh. Saving me from this sand?" Sakura asked. Her Uchiha future baby daddy simply raised an eyebrow, but did not turn to look at her.

"Nope, sorry, can't," was all that he said. Sakura, for her part, didn't even blink at the blasé answer.

"And why can't you?" she asked.

"Naruto's supposed to," was his answer. Sakura still did not give in.

"And why can you not?" she asked again. Sasuke shrugged his shoulders.

"Cause reasons."

"Ah," and then the conversation died.

They stood there in silence as they waited.

Shukaku roared in the distance, the very action uprooting trees and blasting away layers of dirt.

And then silence once more.

Silence reigned as the two rested in their differing resting places.

It was not the scene Naruto was expecting to return to.

"Uh, hey guys." Naruto was confused. "What's going on here?"

Sasuke pointed to the One Tailed Beast. "Kill it."

"Uh," Naruto looked up at the hulking beast. Quite simply, it laid in pieces. Even as he arrived Sasuke had cut off more and more of its body to the point it was more or less just a giant sand head…

… that was the size of a house.

"I… think you got this?" Naruto said. Sasuke just sucked his teeth.

"No, I don't. _You're_ supposed to have this. I learned my lesson. Now go do whatever it is that you did last time."

Naruto looked at the One Tailed Beast's head. It was trying to reassemble its body, but the ridiculous amounts of ambient lightning chakra made it difficult for it to control itself.

"I think Gamabunta is a bit of an overkill," Naruto said offhandedly. Sasuke rolled his eyes.

"Listen, bring out your stupid toad thing and get this over with."

Naruto bristled. "My _stupid toad thing_ is the best summon in the land right now, so I'd appreciate it if you learnt proper respect."

Sasuke scoffed. "Toads? Better than Snakes? Get real. What are you gonna do? Lick me to death?"

"I just might!" Naruto screamed. Jumping back he started to gather an insane amount of chakra. Only problem was that he was facing Sasuke, not the One Tailed Beast.

"Just what I was hoping for!" Sasuke screamed in retaliation. He jumped back as well, going through the same motions. Chakra positively _saturated_ the air as the two young powerhouses prepared to summon their strongest allies.

"I'm gonna hate this," Sakura groaned.

She wasn't wrong.

XxX

"I'M SO SORRY, SENSEI!" Orochimaru screamed as he dodged several dozen elemental attacks of varying natures. Ducking with snakelike agility honed years in the making, Orochimaru successfully allowed a wave of water, not wind, to cut into the tree bark behind his head.

"Oh, you will be," Sarutobi Hiruzen sighed. The aged Hokage sat where he was on a slightly elevated part of a branch. Rubbing at his back, the Third seemed to almost not be taking the battle seriously. His several shadow clones, however, were.

"I'VE LEARNED MY LESSON, SENSEI! CALL OFF YOUR SHADOW CLONES!"

"I will as soon as you call off my former teachers." Hiruzen then turned to said teachers, both of which were encased in domes of ash. "How are you, by the way? How is the afterlife treating you?"

"Can't complain. The women are simply _heavenly_ ," the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju replied. Only his face was visible as the rest of his body was covered completely in ash that moved in very specific sealing arrays. Regardless, his facial features were more than what was necessary to convey his mirthful expression. His eyebrows wiggled rapidly.

"That pun was terrible," Tobirama Senju, the Second Hokage, snapped. He was in a similar situation to his brother, up to his neck in sealing ash. Unlike his brother, however, his face was set in a scowl. "We weren't even in heaven."

"So? There were _girls_ there!" Hashirama retorted, his smile splitting his cracked face. Even though his eyes were darkened with the effects of the Reanimation Technique he was currently being controlled by, they still relayed the endless glee the man found at every passing moment.

Tobirama, the more sensible of the two brothers, just sighed, already weary of his sibling's way too happy expression. "And what if I told Mito of this?"

Instantly the First Hokage's smile vanished, replaced with a concerned, and almost fearful, frown. "Don't tell Mito. You won't get off the hook either."

Tobirama sputtered, his stoic face faltering immediately. "Why am I at fault as well? I have committed no crime!"

"You know how Mito is," Hashirama deadpanned. "You were there, so you're also at fault. Or do you think you can overpower her?"

Tobirama wore a look that very clearly said ' _yes, I could'_.

It was really too bad that Hashirama wore a look that said ' _you better not'_.

"No," Tobirama relented with a sigh. "No, I don't think I could."

"Very nice!" Hashirama all but shouted. "So we're not telling anyone anything?"

Everyone in the clearing shook their heads, with the exception of Orochimaru, who had to completely bend his head backwards to avoid it being severed by a wave of rock.

"ROCK ISN'T EVEN THE ELEMENT FOR CUTTING!" Orochimaru yelled, his scientific, fact driven mind managed to scream through panicked screams. The Third Hokage sucked his teeth.

"You always lacked imagination, my dear student. It appears I have to teach you that as well."

"Wait, how do you teach imagina-"

Orochimaru was really happy he slipped on that leaf as the wave of mud sailed over his face and cut a tree behind him into ribbons.

XxX

"So, nothing about this is normal," Asuma said, the statement coming out more as a question. As the older and more experienced of the two surviving ninja in the immediate area, such was his shock that he was asking his own student for confirmation.

An explosion sounded somewhere in the general direction they were looking. Apparently more was happening than they could see. What they _could_ see, however, was a giant snake and a giant frog battling each other to the death.

"No," Shikamaru sighed, the words falling out of his mouth as if there was no better way for them to come. "Unless they learned the ability to summon in the month or so since the tournament, then I highly doubt this is normal for them."

"But, then," Asuma started, only to stop as an altercation from the two giant combatants nearly knocked him off his feet. The giant snake dodged a sword slash from the frog, only to attempt to coil around the frog, binding it's arms together. Unhinging its jaw, the snake attempted to swallow the frog whole, only for a gigantic ball of roiling chakra to appear from nowhere and wrench its jaw even further open. Apparently not ready for the counter, the snake could only fall back, stunned.

"But… then…" Asuma tried to start again, only to be interrupted when the frog stomped it's foot on the downed snake's body, creating another earthquake that upset the balance. Lifting its sword in the air, the frog attempted to cut down its purple enemy…

Only to be engulfed in black flames.

"What-"

"No, sensei…" Shikamaru drawled. "There's no sense in even _trying_ to make sense of this."

Asuma could only gape. If a Nara said that there was no making sense of this, then there probably wasn't.

XxX

Naruto and Sasuke fell, their summons disappearing in gigantic plumes of smoke. Both touching down on tree branches, the two young warriors glared at each other across the gap between their perches.

"See?" Naruto asked. "I told you that toads were better!"

In return, Sasuke glared. His Sharingan eyes flared, the kaleidoscope pattern spinning ominously. Not for the first time had the raven haired neo-boy wanted nothing more than to trap Naruto in his Tsukiyomi for the rest of time.

He'd probably die doing it, but it was worth it in the long run.

But then Sasuke realized something. He literally couldn't use his Sharingan on Naruto anymore. Even forgoing the fact that Sasuke doubted that even _he'd_ survive spending that much time with Naruto— and he could mute the blonde in his Tsukiyomi world— but even before that, the damned Uzumaki had _that_ technique.

Sasuke wasn't sure how Talk no Jutsu worked when the man couldn't even talk, but he'd personally seen the boy stare down an enemy, before convincing said enemy to his side. With his mouth shut. By a jutsu.

So like every other time he was tempted to, Sasuke did the most effective thing he could. He grunted on turned around, before walking away. This had the profound effect of pissing Naruto off.

"Hey, bastard! Get back here!" Naruto called, and for all of his profound speed, the orange clad boy ran after the Uchiha at little more than civilian speed. Sasuke was about to ignore the boy harder, a feat that he was pretty sure an Uchiha exclusive feat, when Gaara decided to make himself known once more.

"H-how are you so strong?" Gaara gasped from the floor of the forest. The boy was lying in a pool of his own fallen sand, barely able to pick himself off the ground. Despite his apparent fatigue, however, he still had it in him to glare angrily at his fellow Jinchuuriki.

Sasuke raised an eyebrow. Apparently at some point in their summon battle, either Gamabunta or the Snake Boss had awoken Gaara, ending the transformation. It wasn't exactly how it had gone last time, but technically Naruto _had_ awoken Gaara using Gamabunta, so maybe that was enough?

"How many people have you killed to prove your existence?" Gaara asked. Sasuke idly wondered if Naruto had killed anyone at all on purpose. "How many should I?"

Naruto, in his infinite wisdom and leadership qualities, didn't even look back. "Tch, dumbass. You don't need to kill people to prove yourself. You have your family right there. You've _always_ had them. They'll love you."

And apparently that was enough, because shortly after Naruto had finished, the two Sand Siblings appeared to haul their youngest brother away. At that point it was harder _not_ to notice the look of unashamed awe on Gaara's face. It was gone as soon as it came, however, for Kankuro and Temari had the boy gone in the very next moment.

What _was_ hard to notice was the look in Naruto's eyes as he caught up to Sasuke. In the future, Naruto's hair was always cut short, almost to the scalp, so that his eyes could always show. They were strong, tempered in hardships and a burning determination to always succeed, but also impossibly gentle with the love for his own.

Now, however, Naruto's hair was much longer. The spiky bangs covered the boy's eyes easily, and for someone like Sasuke, who had had so much experience reading the blonde Hokage, the hidden facets there were clear as day.

The last Uchiha reached out to grasp his counterpart's shoulder. Naruto barreled past him without a word.

"Let's go, Sasuke," his Hokage said. The command was evident, and long has it been since Sasuke had ignored an order. This was one such rare occasion.

"Naruto, what's wro-"

"I said, _let's go, Sasuke_ ," Naruto's voice was stern, and the raven haired avenger was forced into silence. Shrugging, he simply followed his commander, but made a silent vow that he eventually decided to say aloud.

"You'll tell me, eventually. Just because you're the only one who can use that infernal technique doesn't mean that the rest of us can't just talk."

In response, Naruto just grunted. It was a cold day in hell when Naruto decided to take a cue from _Sasuke_ for emotional responses.

Up in the trees, Sakura was looking down at her two teammates in unmasked curiosity. If she needed any more confirmation on her love's deference to their blonde teammate, there it was. An outright command followed up by a stern reaffirmation, Naruto was definitely the one running the shots here.

"But… why?" Sakura asked. As far as she could remember, the one leading the pack was always Naruto. What changed?

Using all of the stealth that was available to her —a red dress wearing, pink haired young girl— Sakura followed her team via the treetops above them. Something wasn't right here, and she would have to figure out what.

XxX

Hinata was never a… shy… person.

Oh sure, she _seemed_ shy to your average viewer, but to those particularly ninja-like observers who could look underneath the underneath, one could note that Hinata was just really socially awkward.

Now, those two character traits usually melded together, as one usually induced the other, but such was not the case for Hinata Hyuuga, heiress of the Hyuuga clan and future matriarch of the Uzumaki clan. Hinata wanted nothing more than to make friends, be social, and pursue the one true prize that the rest of Konoha so foolishly overlooked.

Hinata wanted nothing more than tackle glomp Naruto to the ground and proclaim him hers and only hers _forever_.

And she would do it to.

If only she knew _how_ to without seeming a social pariah.

And it's not even like Naruto would even particularly be offended by it. The boy so positively radiated acceptance that Hinata was sure that she could stick a hole through his chest and he would still be adamant about being friends.

And speaking of sticking things into holes, Hinata was _particularly_ excited by the thought of them doing _that_ activity alone together.

The problem with… any of that… however was that Hinata still had an image to maintain. She couldn't very well go around making any friends if everyone thought that she was some kind of weirdo! It just wouldn't do! So Hinata settled for letting people think she was just quiet and shy. People never thought badly of the quiet and shy people.

Except for Naruto, of course. Figures that the one person she needed acceptance from would find her safe social path to be weird. In the efforts of preserving that hopefully-more-than-friendship Hinata decided to steer well clear of Naruto for now, at least until she could properly approach him without clamming up.

That plan, however, changed really quickly. A disaster of monumental proportions had struck Konoha, and Hinata wasn't entirely sure how to react. She knew that something like this would happen sometime, I mean, it was _bound_ to happen sometime. She just didn't think it would happen so soon.

Another girl had noticed Naruto.

Oh, and a war was happening. But that could be handled at a later time. Wars come and go, but there was only one Naruto to sink her teeth into, and that was a treat that Hinata Hyuuga wasn't willing to share.

As the Hyuuga heiress approached the bun haired girl that dared attach herself to her future baby daddy, the only thought that ran through the girl's mind was:

"It really is convenient that she has all these weapons around."

XxX

Tenten is one of the most skilled ninjas in the Hidden Leaf Village. That is an undeniable fact.

Whereas most ninjas waste their time learning to shatter continents with their bare hands or other otherworldly stupid ninja magic stuff, Tenten did the one practical thing and trained with weapons. She trained with the things until her skill with the things reached a point where she could be called a "Weapons Mistress" at fourteen years old.

And she only improved from there.

By the time she was a fully grown adult with her own shop to adult in, Tenten was so renowned with her weapons that most people put _away_ theirs when fighting her in the fear that the tools would cower before their true master.

Tenten was one of the Hidden Leaf's best ninjas, and it was for that reason that even she knew who to cow to.

Naruto was an easy one. The boy was nigh invulnerable to all but the strongest attacks, and even those barely even fazed him as— with the addition of Kurama's chakra and Hashirama's cells, not to mention his ability to regrow souls— Naruto could simply recover from anything that dared harm them.

And then the boy was crafty enough to come up with eight different ways to cut down the idiot that attacked him.

Sasuke was another easy one. Even not speaking on the boy's own accomplishments, the Uchiha was mad enough to be best friends with someone like Naruto, even if it was by force. You don't mess with someone who can handle that level of madness.

Finally, the last easy one was Sakura Uchiha. Insanity of that level speaks for itself. Never mind that she was the Third of the Second Generation of Sannin. Sakura Uchiha was a good friend, an even better mother, and totally, criminally, batshit insane.

There were just some people you didn't mess with. Those were the easy ones.

A not so easy one, however, was one Hinata Uzumaki. Hinata was… an interesting one to say the least. To be honest, Tenten was never really sure why exactly she was always so afraid of the blue haired beauty. And then it hit her, ironically, on the day of the shy girl's wedding.

Up there, at the altar, as Hinata stared lovingly into the eyes of her long sought after almost husband, Naruto was simply rubbing his hand on the back of his head in a nervous habit that he had since he was a child. In truth, it was an action that was incredibly cute. It was cute, adorable, and every sense of the word in how it was just so… Naruto. People had gotten used to it, and no one really had it in them to tell the boy to stop.

Hinata had it in her to tell him to stop. A serene smile on her face, the soon to be Uzumaki bride said the one word, and the strongest man in the Elemental Nations acceded to her order.

Tenten figured out all at once why she feared Hinata. She could cow Naruto of all people, who would not back down even before a "god".

You bend knee before your master's master. Tenten did the very same.

So you could imagine the young Weapon Master's fear when she heard the young heiress's voice echo through the air like a reaper's sigh. It was, horrifyingly enough, the same tone the girl would one day use to mollify her future husband in front of the most powerful people in the world.

"I would like to speak with you Miss… Tenten?"

Tenten, at that moment, respected Naruto more than anything else in the world. That he had managed to remain standing even when faced with a sound so chilling only cemented why he was chosen to be Hokage.

* * *

 **Omake:** How The Shikaku Fight Almost Went

"Stop it!" Gaara snarled as Sasuke severed his gigantic arm of sand once more. With the ease of a person cutting through paper, the Uchiha used his Chidori to saw off the monstrous sand appendages that Gaara kept creating.

"And why would I do that?" Sasuke asked, an eyebrow raised and left hand placed firmly in his pocket. Gaara tried to reform his arm in the time it took the boy to ask the question, only to have it severed once more.

"So I can _kill_ you!" Gaara snarled. Saliva dripped from his open mouth as his manic, heterochrome eyes glared down his opponent. Said opponent simply rolled _their_ eyes, charcoal black as they were.

"That doesn't seem like something that I want." Sasuke then sliced off Gaara's tail. As no one in the clearing even saw the boy move from his place on a completely different tree branch, this was impressive. "It also doesn't seem like something you can do."

"I will _murder_ you!" Gaara said, his left eye now fully golden and slit. Sasuke rolled his eyes once more.

"Mhm, and I'm the Fourth Hokage."

Naruto, unfortunately, arrived in the clearing at that exact moment. Upon hearing the comment, he turned to his raven haired compatriot and smiled.

"Oh, is that so, Sasuke? Should I be calling you 'daddy' now?"

Sasuke scowled, though it wasn't as bad as it usually was. "You know that you're the reason why everyone thinks we're gay for each other, right?"

Naruto shrugged. "I don't care what they think. No one can actually do anything to me and I've already got the girl of my dreams. If I want to flirt with my best friend then I will."

Sasuke, for the third time in five minutes, rolled his eyes. "I'd rather you didn't."

"Oh yeah?" Naruto asked. "What are you gonna do about it? Ground me, 'dad'?"

Sasuke smirked. "Oh? Maybe. Bad boys do need to be punished."

Sakura, who was being held to a tree by sand that _even now was being severed every time it formed_ , promptly got a nose bleed and fainted. Both boys felt relieved.

"Thank the gods," Sasuke sighed. "I thought we'd never get her to pass out."

"We were getting her to pass out?" Naruto asked. "Oh right. Of course."

Sasuke stared at his commander, "Kakashi told you to stop flirting with me all the time. It's sexual harassment."

"Oh shut it, you like it."

Sasuke's smirk was all the answer he needed.

"Besides, I spent all that time hunting you down. I think I deserve a little loving."

Sasuke simply rolled his eyes once more. Seeing that the Uchiha was done with the conversation, Naruto turned to the other person among them. "Hey Gaara."

Said sand ninja winced at the brightness in Naruto's smile. It took him a while to compose himself, but when he did, he snarled at the newcomer. "Who are you? Will you be able to prove my existence?"

Naruto snorted. "Nobody can do that but yourself, buddy. Not even your mother."

Gaara snarled even more. "You… would dare disrespect Mother?"

"Yeah, buddy. I dare." Then Naruto promptly knocked the future Kazakage out. Normally this would be a fair, even humane, tactic as far as shinobi went, but for this particular ninja such an action was a death wish.

" **I'm free**!" Shukaku, the one tailed beast hidden away inside of Gaara, roared as he gained full control of his host's body. Now that Gaara was asleep, his seal was just weak enough to allow the Shukaku the ability to roam free. The sand beast wasted no time in assembling his true form, and sand from seemingly nowhere swirled around Gaara's body until a giant raccoon-like beast towered over even the tallest of Konoha's trees.

Konoha's trees were about seven stories tall.

" **It's dinner time**!" Shukaku bellowed, his golden slit eyes sizing up the adolescent children before him like particularly tasty treats. Said treats were not impressed.

" _This_ was the Ichibi? This is what we were afraid of when we were little?" Sasuke was disappointed, if his droopy eyes and deadpan expression was anything to go by. "He seemed so much… bigger. And deadlier. I remember him having more spikes."

"I remember several heads," Naruto added. "And I don't know why, but he was on fire."

"I remember that too!" Sasuke said, nodding his head vigorously. "Why isn't this one on fire?"

"Do you want to make it on fire?" Naruto asked. Sasuke's grin was predatory.

"Oh please, yes."

" **It's time to— what**?" Shukaku was stunned as his right arm was suddenly engulfed in white hot flames. He hadn't seen anything alight him, nor felt a fire growing. One second his arm was okay, the next it was just completely engulfed in flame.

"Smaller than your normal fires," Naruto commented. Sasuke shrugged.

"I wanted to enjoy myself. Burning everything to ashes within seconds gets boring."

"Never thought I'd live to hear those words."

Shukaku was understandably confused. " **Wait, what's going on here?** " The grains of sand in his arm were starting to fuse to make glass. Also his right arm was now on fire. " **No, seriously. I don't understand. What's going on here?** "

"I'm burning you to death!" Sasuke yelled. Shukaku looked around for the source of the voice. He looked down at the ant-like humans before him and dismissed them from being the creature capable of burning him so thoroughly. He looked elsewhere.

"Did that son of a bitch just ignore me?" Sasuke asked. He was puffed up, obviously annoyed.

"You know, I think he did," Naruto answered.

"I'm gonna electrocute him!" Sasuke yelled, then jumped straight towards the behemoth. Naruto, the admittedly less intelligent of the two, considered telling his friend that he was trying to electrocute a giant creature made purely of nonconductive sediments, but decided to let this play out. He'd seen less probable things.

I mean, there was that one time he went back in time. Well, not _this_ time he went back in time, but that other one.

"Die, you sand bastard!" Sasuke yelled. He leaped off the nearest, tallest tree he could find and headed straight for the sand beast's chest. A human bullet, Sasuke soared through the air, the beginnings of his Chidori blazing in his palm. The Shukaku heard the screeching of a thousand birds, and briefly his attention turned back towards the tiny, insignificant speck currently flying towards him with some sort of death wish. Of course, the One Tail Beast paid such a thing no mind, and went back to looking for the thing that set him on fire.

So it was to Shukaku's surprise that the small, insignificant speck managed to blow a hole through his gut several hundred yards bigger than it actually was.

" **Why are things not making sense**?" Shukaku roared. It attempted to reform, but every time it came close, the Uchiha would pass through and somehow blow another hole in it. " **Stop that!** "

Sasuke didn't respond, but his cocky smirk was visible to everyone.

* * *

 _ **Let me know what you think!  
**_


	20. Chapter 20: Return To Insanity

_**TURNS OUT THAT THIS IS TOO LONG. HERE IS PART ONE OF TWO OF THE FINAL CHAPTER.**_

 _ **Hey, my beautiful fans, have you ever wondered why Tenten, Orochimaru, and Kakashi never directly interacted with each other? I mean, now that I look back at it, I would say that I made this pretty obvious**_ _ **.**_

 _ **Enjoy. Also I had to type this in my phone.**_

 ** _No wifi rocks._**

 ** _Prepare for, I guess, insanity._**

 ** _EDIT: Tamapyon, you beautiful bastard. I don't know how I skipped your review last chapter, or if you commented after it, but thank you. Such in depth analysis explaining what you found enjoyable will really help me going forward. Thank you so much._**

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxX

Yellow chakra and swirling sand spun in midair around The Kunai. Glowing with the blue glyphs commonly found on the One Tailed Beast, the monster known as Shukaku, the blade hummed with a fraction of the power it once had at its prime. At some point, Naruto thought he would be fascinated by the phenomena going on before him. This was a weapon that had somehow gained sentience and a chakra network, and eagerly ate up Tailed Beast Chakra as if it were its own.

Now, however, Naruto just felt empty.

"It's not sticking," a familiar, if stoic voice said from behind him.

Once more Naruto found himself sitting on the old water tank on top of some random Konoha building. His shorter legs dangled in the wind as he sat on the edge, and somehow, without looking, Naruto knew that Sasuke was sitting in the same way on the other side of the tank. "Why did it stick the first time, but not this time?"

Naruto sighed. He turned the kunai over and over, watching as the sand swirled around the blade as the Shukaku's chakra slowly bled off of it. Had the chakra bound itself properly, the energy would be encased within. As it was now, Naruto only had enough time to steal some chakra from the residual left behind from Gaara's transformation. This wasn't right.

"I don't know," Naruto said finally. "I think it might be because last time I had pumped all nine chakras into it at once. Maybe they reach some sort of harmony when they're together or something. I dunno."

"Hmm," Sasuke grunted. In true Uchiha fashion he said nothing else, and for a time the wind was the only sound between them. Usually Naruto was the one to break the silence, his hyperactive mind not comprehending the concept of silence, as if its very existence baffled him. Sasuke found himself breaking the silence this time. "Isn't this why you got Tenten to help?"

Naruto sighed, letting out what seemed to be weeks of exhaustion. "Yes," he admitted, "I had a feeling that the chakras wouldn't simply bind with the blade again." The blonde twirled the blade in his hand once more. "Tenten knows all about binding chakra to weapons though. She can get the chakra to work, even if just for a bit, until I can get the rest of the Tailed Beasts to lend me some energy."

The roof then fell back into silence. Not even the streets below the two future heroes made a sound. Most villagers and ninjas were off lamenting the loss of the Third Hokage, and as such most of the Hidden Leaf Village was a veritable ghost town.

Eventually Sasuke had enough. "Okay, I'm tired of this."

Naruto finally looked up when the boy behind him made to stand. "Tired of what, exactly?"

"This," Sasuke said, waving his hand at his blonde best friend. "You. Everything, and all this. What you're doing. What you're not doing. I'm tired of all of this."

Naruto was at a loss. "Excuse me?"

"You're moping around," Sasuke continued. "That's not you. That's not who you are. Either stop doing that, or tell me what's wrong." Sasuke placed his hand on his hip. "It's your choice."

"I'm not quite following," Naruto said slowly, golden brows furrowing. "Are you… concerned for me?"

Sasuke huffed. "You know damn well that I am. Now, are you going to tell me what's wrong?"

"In a sec, I have to process this. I never thought this day would come. I have to tell everyone." Naruto pulled out a phone. Sasuke electrocuted it.

"I don't even know where you got that," Sasuke said, his outstretched hand crackling with electricity. "Phones aren't invented yet."

"Tenten," was all Naruto said. Sasuke's mouth hung open. After a minute he regained his senses.

"How the hell does she bring things back from the future."

Naruto shrugged, before standing up. "I stopped asking Tenten questions a long time ago."

"Was it around the time she started trying to cut Lee's hair, only to realize that The Power of Youth resists all forms of damage, even in body hair?"

Naruto shook his head. As he did so, a small aura of wind started to whip up around him. "No. It was around the time that she started trying to weaponize playing cards."

"Didn't she succeed?" Sasuke asked. The wind circulating Naruto had started to turn into veritable blades, cutting at everything within reach. Sasuke started to bat errant blades away with his charged hand.

"She did," Naruto responded. The blond jumped down from the water tank, and onto the roof the container was sitting on. Turning, he stared at his raven haired friend. "I'd rather not talk about it. It'll only remind me of the toast."

"Did she complete the toast throwing stars?" Sasuke asked, eyebrow quirked. "Last time I was in the village, it was only in beta stage."

Naruto shook his head. A Rasengan started to form in his hand. The wind started to funnel into the orb, and a piercing, screeching noise started reverberate through the area. "She finished the Shuri-Toast a while ago. I'm talking about the Kunai Toast."

"Dear Gods," Sasuke whispered, sounding genuinely shocked. "The madwoman."

"Indeed," Naruto responded. Above him, the boy could see his rival's acknowledged arm engulfed in flame, before the electricity burst through the pitch blackness once more. "Hey, Sasuke. I'll be honest."

"I don't think you have the mental capacity to lie," Sasuke responded. He was rewarded for that comment with a particularly precise blade of wind almost gouging his eyes out. "Go on."

"I know it was forever ago," Naruto started, his voice starting to fall into the breeze that was roiling into his attack. "But now, it's going to be tomorrow as well. You know?"

Sasuke didn't know. To be honest, nothing Naruto usually said made any sense. The blonde liked to think that he was making a point, but more often than not Naruto would just string together words in the hopes that they would fall into a sentence eventually.

Naruto literally threw words at a wall and waited to see what stuck.

So it's hard to blame the little idiot for his social ineptitude. He was barely schooled, after all. That being said, it is also hard to blame Sasuke for his inability to understand. Instead, Sasuke did what he did best.

Sasuke bent his legs, before pushing off the water tower with everything he had. The electricity and fire broke apart and disintegrated everything around him as he flew towards his rival. Naruto, his Rasenshuriken finally charged, simply met his partner's advance. Pushing off the roof, Naruto let tiles and gate wire alike get torn apart on a cellular level as he flew through the air towards the raven haired boy.

"NARUTO," Sasuke screamed, his lungs burning with the effort of conveying all of his emotions in a single word. Focusing on his counterpart's eyes, Sasuke could see the pure emotion that lay within the sapphire orbs.

"SASUKE," Naruto responded. With a single scream, Naruto tried to convey everything he couldn't using words. Mirroring his rival, Naruto brought his hand forward, bringing the blue ball of destruction with it as Sasuke thrust forward his attack.

The two powerhouses were so focused on each other, so single-mindedly intent on the other, that neither noticed the third, and only female, member of their team rush out from her hiding place in the roof door. Sakura's eyes were bloodshot as she used every ounce of energy she had to try and stop the two boys from killing each other.

Naruto and Sasuke were moving at speeds that started to approach light. Sakura was a thirteen year old girl that was honestly out of shape for her profession. There was no way that she should have been able to reach the impact zone before the two collided.

And yet she did.

Somewhere, a floating old man smiled.

XxX

"What… the FUCK… is going on here?" Tayuya, the fourth member of Orochimaru's infamous Sound Four team and resident genjutsu master, nearly squeaked. If everything had gone according to plan, then she would have been fleeing with her master by now, and no doubt be planning an infiltration.

Things were not going according to plan for her. For once it wasn't Naruto's fault.

It was his wife's.

"Just shut the hell up and move," Tenten hissed. Sensing something off on the fringe of her awareness, Tenten ducked. A pulse of chakra impacted the tree behind where her head was, cracking it apart.

Tayuya whimpered. Tenten couldn't blame the poor girl.

"Does she ever tire?" Tayuya asked. Her eyes were wide, but also drooping. The poor girl was good, but she wasn't quite at Tenten's level in the future. She couldn't handle several days of nonstop exertion.

"She does," Tenten answered. The bun haired girl threw a kunai to her far right, not quite aiming at anything in particular. The knife embedded itself into a tree. That tree promptly exploded. "Just not when it comes to Naruto."

"Who the flying FUCK is Narut-" was all Tayuya was able to get out before Tenten grabbed her by the collar and teleported away. The mass of trees they were running amongst broke apart, being repelled by an ungodly force.

The two kunoichi landed in a clearing. Tenten remained standing while her charge collapsed to the ground, her legs giving way to exhaustion. Despite her maintained composure, however, Tenten was still breathing heavily.

"I think," Tenten gasped out, "that we're going to have to fight her."

"No… shit…" Tayuya gasped. "Any… plans?"

"Uh…" Tenten started. In the distance, several trees were felled, each fallen tree closer than the last. "Don't die?"

"You are… the pinnacle… of leadership."

A tree on the edge of the clearing snapped, falling over slowly and ominously. When the dust from the impact finally settled, the two kunoichi were greeted to what would be known as the most terrifying thing they had ever seen.

And Tenten had seen the Ten Tails. Tayuya had seen Orochimaru get out of the shower.

Well, the most terrifying thing Tenten had ever seen.

"Miss Tenten?" Hinata asked, her voice too calm and too sweet to belong to the relentless monster that had chased said girl through a forest for several days. "Why do you run? I just want to talk."

Tenten looked behind Hinata. There was a literal path of destruction marked by the toppled trees Hinata had bowled over in her nonstop advance. If she looked hard enough, Tenten could even see the ones that the Hyuuga had all but disintegrated.

Tenten looked back at Hinata. "I highly doubt that you 'just want to talk'."

"Yeah… you bimbo… what's… your problem?" Tayuya struggled to get out. Already seeing where this was going, Tenten subtly inched away from the red haired girl.

Whether or not Hinata was upset at being called a bimbo wasn't perceivable. With a serene smile on her face, Hinata simply tilted her head as she slowly walked forward.

Tenten, in turn, slowly backed away.

"Nothing, really," Hinata said, her voice regal if not downright terrifying. "I just want to know why Miss Tenten here," Hinata gestured to Tenten. The bun haired girl resisted the urge to flee. "Was messing around with my Naruto."

"H-Hinata," Tenten pleaded. "H-He's allowed to talk to other women."

"Of course he is," Hinata responded. Her smile looked plastered on. "He can talk to any woman he likes. He's not allowed to flirt with them without my permission." Hinata's smile turned predatory. "And women are definitely not allowed to flirt with him."

"Hinata, I wasn't flirting with hi-"

"So this is about a stupid fucking quarrel with some stupid fucking boy?" Tayuya tried to pick herself off the floor, but only managed to lift her upper body. "You chased us through the fucking jungle for three fucking days because of some stupid boy?"

Tenten didn't miss the way that Hinata twitched every time Tayuya said 'stupid boy'. She inched closer and closer to the treeline in the hopes that she would be able to make a break for it.

"I didn't even have anything to do with your fucking boy toy! I don't have anything to do with this at all!"

Hinata's eye started twitching.

"So if you could do me a favor, why don't you leave me alone, fuck off, and take this bun haired bimbo with you! With any luck, she can find your stupid little Naruto. She apparently flirts with him bett-"

Tenten almost jumped out of her skin when Hinata simply… appeared… in front of Tayuya. Like a viper, Hinata's hand darted forward and clasped firmly around Tayuya's throat. The Sound ninja gasped as her oxygen supply was steadily being cut off.

"I… no… what…?" Tayuya gasped. This was clearly a new thing for her.

"You do not get to say his name, harlot." Hinata did not look pleased.

"I don't… wait… what?" Tayuya gasped. The weight of the situation had finally started to bear on the poor girl. "Bun… bitch… help?" Tayuya looked around for her temporary companion.

Only to see that Tenten had evacuated while the white eyed monster was fixated on her.

"You're… fucking… bitch…" Tayuya gasped, directing all of her hate at Tenten.

Hinata only squeezed harder.

XxX

Tenten dead sprinted through the forest, upending dirt, leaves and small bushes in her wake. Tayuya was a noble, if unwitting, sacrifice. She had uttered the forbidden, and as such deserved her fate.

Though, to be honest, Tenten didn't remember ever telling Tayuya what exactly the forbidden was.

"She should have known better than to say 'Naruto' where Hinata could hear her. It's not my fault. It's not my fault at all." Tenten tried to reassure herself. "I'm completely guilt free."

Really, it was more karma that clotheslined the kunoichi than Hinata's arm.

Tenten fell, hitting the forest floor hard. Hinata emerged from the tree she was hiding behind, her smirk gone, but replaced by the multiple splashes of red on her face.

"H-Hinata! What are you doing here?"

Hinata tilted her head. "Chasing you, of course. We still need to talk."

"W-we do?" Tenten asked. Hinata's response was to crush the tree she was hiding behind. The Hyuuga heiress hadn't moved. The tree simply folded beneath her ire. "Of course we do! What do we need to talk about?"

Hinata's eyes narrowed, focusing in on the girl on the floor beneath her. "Your relationship with Naruto. What's that about?" Tenten could tell Hinata tried to sound casual. The blood stains crisscrossing her face only made her seem more frightening.

"We're, uh, just friends?" Tenten tried. Several trees exploded.

"I want the truth, Miss Tenten," Hinata said, her eye twitch back. "No one is 'just friends' with Naruto. They're either completely indifferent, antagonistic like Sakura, or in love with him, like me…"

Tenten was slightly shocked at how accu-

"… and Sasuke," Hinata finished.

-rate that statement was. Still, that statement was only accurate in the past, and not now. Or, at least, the her of now. "I'm not lying Hinata, I really am-"

"Lies," Hinata said, her voice hard like rocks. "I can tell you two are closer than just friends. Now tell me the truth. Please."

Tenten knew that there was no question being posed there. Shrugging, she figured that she might as well tell the truth.

"I know him so well because we've had years to get to know one another. I know him from the future, where we're both well into adulthood, he's the Hokage and father of your two children, and I'm a world-renowned weapons master."

Now, when Tenten told her story, she expected many different scenarios to happen. She expected Hinata to scoff and threaten her harder for her obvious and outlandish 'lie'. She expected Hinata to start following through on threats. Hell, she expected the Hyuuga to grow tired and just outright kill her.

She didn't expect Hinata to laugh, then accept the story. Honestly, it was the most horrifying outcome thus far.

If Hinata was so far gone that she accepted something like a story about time travel, then Tenten was in a much worse situation than she thought.

"I see," Hinata laughed, the sound like a tinkling of bells. "Then, this is fine."

"I-it is?" Tenten stuttered. In all honesty she was just waiting for the world to turn gray and time to reset. That's what was supposed to happen, right? She hadn't made time restart once since she had returned to the past, so surely she got at least one go?

"Yes," Hinata answered, "it is."

Suddenly the world seemed less cold. Birds that had gone deathly quiet started to sing once more. The wind started blowing, and the air tasted of grass and fresh dew. Somewhere, somehow, someone was being stabbed in the gut by a magical jutsu or another and, hell, Tenten's sinuses cleared. Naruto was probably fighting Sasuke over something stupid, and Hinata was a stuttering shut in again.

All was right in the world once more.

"H-Hinata?" Tenten gasped, the act of saying the name like disarming a bomb. "You okay?"

"Hmm?" Hinata asked, her voice lighter than air and probably as stable. "O-oh, I'm fine T-Tenten."

Hinata then smiled. Tenten's spine tingled.

"You uh," Tenten started, unsure of what to say. Hinata seemed like, well, normal Hinata again. Tenten wasn't fooled, however. She knew that the unmatched demoness wasn't a split personality. Hinata was a dangerous psychopath when she wanted to be. Tenten had to choose her words carefully to make sure that Hinata didn't want to be one right now. "You okay?"

"I couldn't be better, Miss Tenten," Hinata said. Her smile seemed more genuine now, a fact that would have calmed Tenten's frayed nerves if not for the fact that the girl was currently wiping blood off her face as if it were the most normal thing in the world.

To be fair, in their work, wiping blood off of things was fairly common. Wiping your comrades' blood of your face after chasing them for days with the sole intent to maim and/or murder them was arguably less common.

"I… I see," Tenten stuttered. She was about to continue talking, because anything was better than the awkward silence filled only by Hinata's serene smile, when the princess in question broke the silence herself.

"I mean, why wouldn't I be happy? I was just told that I get to marry the man of my dreams! We have not one, but two children, and he even achieves his dream of becoming the strongest man in the entire village."

"Technically, he's the strongest man in the entire world," Tenten added in. The Weapons Master regretted that action immediately as the Hyuuga heiress's head whipped in her direction so fast it created gusts of air. Hinata's face was practically orgasmic.

"Even better," Hinata all but purred. "And he's mine, right? All mine and no one else's?"

"I think Sasuke has some dibs," Tenten murmured, her responses automatic. Her brain had started to shut down in fear. Hinata seemed crazed, and a crazed Hinata, as proven by recent circumstances, was not a good one.

"Well, that's to be expected," Hinata said, waving her hand as if dismissing the fact. "As long as it's just with Sasuke, I don't mind sharing him."

"The kids might have some dibs…" Tenten said, her voice still on autopilot. Hinata's laugh was hollow.

"They have visiting rights through me. No one has dibs besides me and Sasuke. Not Kakashi, not Konohamaru, and especially not…"

The world went silent once more. Somewhere in the distance Tenten could hear the faint cries of "Naruto" and "Sasuke" and nothing else. Hinata practically teleported again, but this time over to Tenten. Grabbing the girl by the shoulders, Hinata stared into her senior kunoichi's eyes, her own burning with the rage of a thousand suns.

"Miss Tenten?" Hinata asked. Tenten nodded her head so quickly it hurt. "What has become of Sakura?"

"Sh-she's married," Tenten stuttered. "T-to Sasuke."

"And Naruto," Hinata continued. "What are his feelings towards her?"

"Th-they're still close, b-but nothing romantic!" Tenten squeaked, answering to the best of her ability. She prayed that her truths were good enough.

"That's… odd…" Hinata murmured, more to herself than Tenten. "I would have thought that I would have set him against her by… how old am I in the future?"

"I-I think somewhere in your thirties?" Tenten said, unsure of her own age at this point.

"How long have we been married?" Hinata asked. Her grip on Tenten's shoulders was starting to get painful.

"A-about six years," Tenten stuttered. Why wasn't time restarting yet? "You married shortly after Himawari was born."

Hinata grimaced. "Is that my son? Did I name him that?"

"No," Tenten said, shaking her head. "That was the name of your daughter. Himawari Uzumaki."

"Oh," Hinata's grimace faded. "I guess that means that Neji is dead."

Tenten resisted the urge to ask how the two facts were connected at all.

"What of my son? What is his name?"

"Boruto," Tenten answered. Hinata's face was blank.

"Naruto named him."

Tenten couldn't find it in her to deny that.

"Oh well. They can't all be winners. I'll just ask him what he was thinking when he named our children directly." Hinata then let go of Tenten. The bun haired girl rubbed her shoulders. "Are you coming along?"

Tenten could still hear Naruto and Sasuke yelling in the distance. As Hinata had chased them well enough away from the village, this was impressive. "I think we should give Naruto some time right now."

Hinata, who had started to walk away, turned around slowly. The serene smile, and dear gods was Tenten starting to reevaluate the meaning of that word, was back. With partially lidded eyes, the Hyuuga heiress spoke her next words with the same amount of certainty one would use to say that the sun would rise the next morning.

"Oh, he'll make time for me," Hinata said.

Tenten whimpered as she followed after the thirteen year old.

XxX

Gloved hands grasped the wrists of both boys and pulled. Using the momentum of the two attacks against them, Kakashi Hatake redirected both the Flame Style: Black Raikiri and the Sage Style: Rasenshuriken into the two water silos that sat atop the roof.

Both water silos disintegrated. They simply did not exist anymore.

Naruto and Sasuke struggled to stand. Their high powered attacks were taxing even in their base forms, but both boys had poured all of their energy into the techniques this time in an effort to overpower the other.

"Kakashi?" Sasuke asked, being the first to coherently recover. "What are you doing here?"

The masked man smiled, his eye crinkling being the only visible indicator of that action even taking place. "Maa, I think the better question would be, 'what are all of you doing up here?'"

Naruto, who recovered second, stuck out his tongue. "Hey, Kakashi-sensei, no fair. We asked first!"

"Well," Kakashi mused. He had pulled out a book from somewhere, and was now paying it more regard than he did the two boys throwing mountain destroying abilities at each other. "I asked better. Now answer."

"I… think…" Sakura gasped. She hadn't fully recovered from being between what basically equated as two nuclear warheads, but that she had recovered at all was summarily impressive. "The better… question should… be… what the hell was all that?"

Kakashi looked up from his book. Indeed, the water silos that were nearly a staple of the Hidden Leaf Village since its founding now seemed to have never been there at all. Such was the level of destruction that his two "students" had wrought.

"That is a rather pertinent question," Kakashi said, his head back in his book. Sakura stared at her teacher, wondering whether his nonchalant attitude was a coping mechanism or a technique used specifically to drive people insane.

Knowing the man, it was both.

"We… um…" Naruto stammered. He was never the most eloquent of... basically anything. Sasuke decided to throw the man a bone this one time.

"It was a dream. You're both dreaming," the Uchiha said. Naruto facepalmed.

"You're terrible at lying," Naruto said. Sasuke glared at him.

"Well, excuse me. You'll find that it's a skill I've never had to use when I could just as easily tell the truth, then turn into a giant purple skeleton." Sasuke then sheathed his hands in his pockets again. "Besides, you weren't doing any better. If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were taking cues from your wife."

"Hey!" Naruto shouted. "Don't talk about Hinata like that! She can hear you."

XxX

Halfway back to the Hidden Leaf, Hinata sneezed. Tenten's mini heart attack was justified.

XxX

"I don't understand your fear of your wife," Sasuke started. "Sure, she isn't exactly a pushover, but that you're so afraid of her doesn't really make sense."

"To be fair," Kakashi grunted. "You weren't at the wedding."

"Yeah!" Naruto piggybacked off of his teacher. "If you heard what she was like, you'd understand my pain."

Sasuke rolled his eyes. "If she is so abusive, then why are you still with her? It's not like the strongest man in the Elemental Nations would be denied if he filed for a divorce."

To this, Naruto only asked one thing. "How many times have you met Himawari?"

Sasuke, who was about to make another point, closed his mouth. After thinking for a bit, he posed his own question. "What's your point?"

"Hinata is ten times worse."

"Dear gods."

Off to the side, another conversation was taking place, as wont to do whenever Naruto and Sasuke existed in the same place at the same time.

"What are they talking about?" Sakura asked. "Naruto and Hinata are married? When was the wedding? Who's Hinawari?" Questions were apparently piling up in Sakura's mind.

"Oh," Kakashi said, his voice only a single octave higher than usual. "I was sure that it was the entirety of Team Seven that came back. I guess it's just us, then."

When Kakashi didn't continue, Sakura just continued for him. It was routine by this point. She would have to fill in the sanity for the whole team. "It's just you… what… exactly?"

"Hmm?" Kakashi mumbled. He raised an eyebrow then looked down at his charge. "Oh, just us men. See, we're all from the future."

Sakura was about to scoff, when she noticed the grayness start to appear on the very outskirts of the world. This wouldn't be the first time that she saw it, and in an attempt to prevent it, she did what she did best.

She played it off as a joke.

"Haha, you're so funny Kakashi-sensei!" Sakura laughed, putting her all into believing that the very serious statement that her teacher made had been a joke. She disregarded the fact that Kakashi Hatake never joked, and almost bought into her own delirium. It wouldn't be the first time she had done so. Already the grayness of the time stop had started to recede, and for a while, Sakura believed that she had once again won.

"You know I don't joke," Kakashi said, starting the onset of the world graying once more. "Sheesh, I liked you better when you were Sakura Uchiha."

To Sakura's benefit, the world stopped graying.

XxX

Elsewhere, an equally disastrous event was taking place.

"Miss Tenten?" Hinata asked. Tenten resisted the urge to wince. How did the girl make talking seem so terrifying?

"What was my name in the future?" Hinata asked. Without looking ahead of her, the "failure" of the Hyuuga main branch leapt between the branches of the trees with all the grace of a swan.

Tenten, not seeing the harm in this, answered her tormentor. "Your name in the future is Hinata Uzumaki, matriarch of the Uzumaki Clan."

Hinata shuddered once in mind numbing glee before falling unconscious. Tenten debated whether or not she should catch the girl, then thought about Naruto's reaction should he find out that she chose not to.

Tenten dove for the girl.

XxX

"- and furthermore, what use could a marital band be when we have the power to literally carve the moon in ha-"

Sasuke's comment stopped halfway. In an unsurprising moment of duality, both godlike children stopped in their bickering to notice an irresistibly chilling spark run up their spines. As if to answer their unspoken question, a thud rang out behind them, the sound easily heard as the entire planet had gone silent.

Some unspeakable evil, some unstoppable force, had been awakened. Roused from it's slumber, the beast's reemergence into this world, the simple act of it moving once more, shushed all those with a survival instinct.

And to make matters worse, there were two of them.

All Naruto and Sasuke saw was their teacher standing next to an unconscious Sakura. The Hatake's head was buried in his book, but even he looked jarred. His eyebrow twitched two whole times.

"Kakashi," Sasuke started. Kakashi looked up from his book. "You're our Kakashi, aren't you?"

Kakashi nodded once. Naruto cursed under his breath.

"Exactly how long have you been our Kakashi?" Sasuke asked, his interrogation continuing.

"Ever since Naruto burned all of my books." Kakashi then shrugged, as if to say "oops."

Immediately Sasuke's head whipped to the side. He addressed thin air with his words. "GRANDPA SAGE. YOU GET YOUR BONY ASS OUT HERE."

The Sage appeared instantly. His face was split with a shit eating grin. "You rang?"

Sasuke pointed at Kakashi. "When exactly were you going to tell us?" The Sage looked at Kakashi. Kakashi looked back. The two nodded at the same time, some unspoken message being conveyed between the two.

"Most likely?" the Sage responded, "never."

"And why not?" Naruto asked between clenched teeth. It was Kakashi that answered.

"To fuck with you, of course." Kakashi turned a page in his book. "The Venerable Sage did say that he was going to actively mess with you. He brought me in to make sure that it happened."

Naruto and Sasuke both shared a scoff. Kakashi decided to cut their glee short right there.

"And before you mount your high horse, no. I'm not the person he brought back to mess with you two. I'm the person he brought back to make sure you get messed with, and I've done that." Kakashi's eye smile widened. "Just so you know, none of the people brought back in time after me were by accident."

Kakashi then looked down at Sakura. She had begun to twitch. The cyclops looked back up to the two horrified boys.

"Enjoy," Kakashi sang, and with a twirl of the Sage of Six Path's staff, the two oldest people on the building were gone.

The two godlike children just looked down at Sakura. She had begun to twitch again.

"Naruto?" Sasuke asked. His voice may or may not have cracked. "Where's Hinata?"

"She's with…" Naruto paled. "She's with Tenten."

XxX

Tenten looked at Hinata's twitching form, and was only too glad to see Hagoromo and Kakashi appear.

"Thank gods you're here. I can't stand being around the little psychopath any longer. I love Hinata to death, but that's in the future, when her insanity was refined." Tenten looked at the cyclops. "You hold up your end?"

Kakashi gave her a thumbs up. Tenten smiled.

"Well then," Tenten all but purred, a Cheshire grin on her face. She held out her hands, and all three conscious ninjas in the clearing held hands. "Shall we watch gods fall?"

The three ninjas teleported out of the area.

Now alone, no one could see Hinata's twitch worsen.

XxX

Orochimaru smiled. Before him, held down by the most powerful sealing array he could muster, was the Nine Tailed Fox. A flash of light heralded his guests, and Orochimaru turned to his three companions with glee.

"Kakashi, Tenten, Hagoromo. It is so good to see you all again!"

Orochimaru held out his arms. No one seemed to reciprocate his joy. While Kakashi branched off to poke at the trapped tailed beast, Tenten immediately vacated to the farthest part of the room from where Orochimaru currently was. She made adjustments to where exactly that was in real time.

"Quite," Hagoromo responded. He nodded once to his trapped fox son, who nodded back unperturbed, before floating over to a giant television screen. It took up almost an entire wall of the room, so it was hard to miss. "Have you set up the cameras?"

"Oh, yes," Orochimaru said, his every syllable sounding perverse and sinister. "The cameras all over the Hidden Leaf, as well as its surrounding forest, should catch every moment of Naruto and Sasuke's downfall."

"Figures you would be all too happy to film Sasuke," Tenten not so quietly whispered. Orochimaru ignored her with practiced ease.

"Shall we watch the fall of gods?" Orochimaru asked, unknowingly copying Tenten's earlier question. Ignoring Tenten's rather violent shudder at the thought that she could ever think similarly to the Snake, Hagoromo nodded.

"Lets," the Sage said, and the television turned on. It showed a rather panicked Naruto and Sasuke, who were currently running for dear life.

"I must say," Kurama started. Kakashi, who was currently poking the fox man, spoke up.

"Why are you speaking so deeply? If I had to imagine your voice in text, it'd be in bold."

Kurama expertly ignored the silver haired cyclops. "I must say, this is a rather smart plan, given those involved." At once, those involved glared at the smiling fox. "What better way to mess with the two most powerful and cunning men in the world…"

"… than with their wives."

XxX

"Naruto," Sasuke asked, his voice coming out hurried and frantic. "Where is Kurama? Why aren't you summoning Kurama?"

"I can't!" Naruto yelled back. His voice, too, was harried, and he ran through a well practiced set of hand seals with speed that would rival light. Fat lot of good it did him, though. "It's just not… It's just not working!"

"Well, make it work!" Sasuke grunted. Even now, the Uchiha could already feel it. She was already waking up, and when she did, she would want answers. His wife's two personalities would crash, much like his own did, and while Sasuke could reconcile himself relatively easy…

He had the added benefit of not being certifiably insane.

Over in Naruto's head, much the same dilemma was going on.

"Oh shit oh fuck oh shit oh FUCK."

It sounded ineloquent, but it was honestly the most appropriate thought to have in such a situation.

"What do we do?" Sasuke asked his commander. "I'm down my Rinnegan, you're down the chakra of the tailed beasts, and now you're telling me you don't even have Kurama? Naruto!" Sasuke screamed. "What. Do. We. Do?"

Naruto, who was still flipping through handseals, worked his rarely used mind into overtime. After a couple seconds, in which time thousands of thoughts went through his head, Naruto turned to his second in command and said the only words that stuck out.

"I don't know."

Sasuke balked. "What do you mean, 'you don't know?' Aren't you Naruto fucking Uzumaki, the world's most unpredictable ninja? We don't pay you not to know, we pay you to pull a victory out of whatever you call a brain up there and get us out of this mess! So start doing it!" Sasuke then shuddered. "Naruto. My wife, she's… she's immortal. You know that, right Naruto? I can't stop her without the Rinnegan. She will definitely kill me. Naruto. What do we do?"

Naruto, noticing his best friend's rapidly declining mental state, stopped his sprint and slapped him as hard as he could. The shock was so sudden, so unexpected, that Sasuke was broken from his train of thought.

He was also broken through several trees, but that was honestly a lesser fact.

"Sasuke. I know," Naruto started. "Believe me, I know. Hinata is… she's special. She's an evil unlike the world has ever seen when she's mad, and she will be clinically mad when she returns from the future. I don't know about you, but I think the only answer available to us is plainly obvious."

Naruto then looked out, over the horizon.

"We run."

XxX

Meanwhile, with Neji.

"Where the hell is everyone?"


	21. Chapter 21

_**So, I had this chapter practically finished, then I realized that I hadn't saved it in a very long time and my computer didn't back it up. When my computer just died on me, I lost all of this.**_

 _ **I was very sad.**_

 _ **I tried to recreate it, which drained me a lot. Then my computer glitched while in the final parts and I tried to save.**_

 _ **I lost it all again. My motivation basically died.**_

 _ **Couple months, several tries later, and my final product comes out a lot different than it was supposed to. I like it, but I feel like this is basically over.**_

 _ **I might do some side chapters, I might even finish it if I do well in life.**_

 _ **But for now, this is it. Thank you for your continued support. Thank you for your comments, and your reassurance. I couldn't have finished this without some of you constantly egging me on, and I love you guys for it.**_

 _ **I have two other stories coming out. They will be on a more set schedule (probably). One is serious. It's plot is not for debate.**_

 _ **The other one, however...**_

 _ **Well, tell me what you think. Once again, thank you for the support.**_

* * *

Konohamaru was a smart boy. He ate his vegetables with every meal and looked both ways— as well as up for the travelling ninja— before crossing the street. He, despite his rancorous reputation, actually studied very hard and knew his arithmetic as well as he was supposed to. He knew the history of the Village he was from, as well as a very limited history of those he wasn't from.

Konohamaru was a very smart boy, or at least as smart as he needed to be. That is why when he saw the rapidly fleeing form of his hero, one Naruto Uzumaki, he didn't call out to the boy as he usually did.

For you see, Konohamaru was a smart boy, and he knew that he wanted nothing to do with the pink haired demon chasing his hero down.

XxX

Sakura was a woman of many things. Perseverance, intelligence and untold grace were only three of the traits that she came to be known for in her adulthood. She was no longer a Haruno, a no-name civilian clan with exactly that much going for her. She was now the matriarch of the Uchiha clan. Sure, it was a rather lonely existence as, more often than not, her husband was away from home, it was still worth it because _she had won_.

She had won Sasuke, and not even from Ino. She had won Sasuke from _Sasuke_ , and the whole damn village knew it. The lonely, brooding, bastard (and wasn't it good to be mature enough to call her husband that?) had lost. She had broken through his emo little heart and burrowed down there, finding a place to call home in its cavernous, unused halls.

It felt good. Sure, he wasn't the strongest in the world, but he was definitely the hardest to get a hold of, and for that Sakura felt proud. Like Naruto had felt when he became the Seventh Hokage, Sakura felt especially vindicated when Sasuke had awkwardly slipped the ring on her finger that faithful night.

It felt good. It felt like closure. It felt like _freedom and happiness and sweet, sweet victory_.

So you can imagine Sakura's pure, unbridled rage when she woke up in the middle of the forest with not only no ring on her finger, but no matching victory in her heart.

Sadly, you can only imagine it, because Sakura's rage was so many times the greater than anything anyone could understand.

" _This is Naruto's fault_ ," the Kunoichi growled, her fury righteous and justified. " _I'm going to kill him. Him and his fox. Then Sasuke. It's his fault somehow, too. I'm going to kill them both, then bring Sasuke back,_ _ **make**_ _him put the ring on my finger, then kill him again_."

The pink haired ninja stomped off in the general direction of the village, her eyes blazing with untold fury. Each step caused a localized earthquake and uprooted nearby trees. Then, suddenly, she stopped. Pulling at a shirt she hadn't been able to fit in for years, Sakura took a peek down at her suddenly much flatter than usual chest.

Then she roared, and the whole world felt their mortality.

"Good news, I'm not going to kill you two anymore," Sakura howled to the two soon to be dead men, wherever they were. "I'm just going to keep you in a state of _very near death_ for the rest of my miserable life. If my master is anything to go by, it's going to be a very long one."

And then she took off, her leap absolutely destroying the area she was in.

XxX

Shikamaru is the smartest existence in The Elemental Nations. This has always been the case. From the time he first came into understanding of the world around him at the ripe age of two, Shikamaru had been on the forefront of understanding and knowledge. He was lazy, sure, but all that time spent doing nothing outwardly was just an excuse to riddle apart the mysteries of the world.

Indeed, at thirteen, there were only a handful of people rivaling Shikamaru in the intellectual department. Subsequent years would make that handful shrink.

So it wouldn't be a stretch to say that Shikamaru had pretty much figured out that his friends were time travelers about as soon as he came into contact with them. Their weird actions, as well as their weird conversations were all he needed to come up with a hypothesis that quickly became fact in the young genius' mind.

Now, if only he weren't so damn lazy that the universe didn't think he was a threat to be corrected.

So, because of his near inability to do anything more than what he was absolutely supposed to, the universe didn't find it necessary to revert the world to before Shikamaru figured out something was going on, so he pretty much was around the entire time.

And true to the Universe's decision, absolutely nothing changed because of it.

" _OH FUCK OH FUCK OH FUCK_ ," the normally stoic Sasuke Uchiha screamed, dojutsu blazing as he ran from the normally timid Hinata Hyuuga, her dojutsu _also_ blazing.

Shikamaru simply stepped to the side, letting the two human bullets blaze through the town.

"Hmm," Shikamaru drawled. "I'm guessing that somehow Hinata was brought back as well. She must be unhappy about this. The only reason I could see why though is if she was Naruto's wife and pissed off that she was torn from her family. Finding no one else to take her wrath out on, as Naruto is notoriously good at hiding, she decided to pursue the next best thing." Shikamaru then let out an exaggerated sigh. "I'm guessing this means that Sakura is back as well, and chasing down Naruto."

Shikamaru then proceeded through the village without a care in the world.

"I guess I better lay low, now."

XxX

"Naruto."

That was the single, sole, all-consuming thought going through the Hyuuga Heiress' mind as she sat nearly unconscious under a tree. It was a nice thought, filled with longing and hope and, though she hadn't known it at the time, _lust_.

It wasn't unusual for Hinata to dream about her crush. To think about her crush. To _stalk_ her crush when the option was available. What _was_ unusual was for her to think about him so often. These recent events had made so many things known to her, and for one, blissful, moment, her thoughts were completely obsessed with her orange wearing, blond admiration.

Had this been allowed to continue, Hinata might have become obsessed. She might have become dangerous. Well, more dangerous than she was already.

Then the Universe was forced to step in, and suddenly everything was just so _clear_ for young Hinata.

The Uzumaki matriarch got a bombardment of emotions out of nowhere. Where she was once washing dishes and getting ready to prepare lunch with her beloved daughter, she was now sitting under a tree with hair far shorter than she remembered.

Most importantly, she was now being hit with some very powerful emotions that she was not expecting. They bordered on obsessive. They bordered on _insane_.

And like the mature, controllably insane woman that Hinata was, she dismissed them all. Where the Hyuuga heiress was experiencing these emotions all at once in the span of a couple minutes, the older Hinata had grappled with these same emotions over the course of three very long, very agonizing years.

She knew how to deal with them. They were the emotions of an emotionally stunted child. She was an emotionally fulfilled adult.

So with a nod of her head, she swept them all away. They were compartmentalized where they needed to and sorted out with an amazing efficiency in the span of two seconds.

With that out of the way, the young Uzumaki stood up. She wiped off her suspiciously short pants (she had taken to wearing dresses) and patted her suspiciously puffy cheeks (her face had become slender and graceful).

Then she looked to the village.

"I'm in the past," she said. Immediately unbridled rage came to her. Like her previous emotions, she pounded it down and put it in its place. With a clear head, she once again regarded the four faces on the Hokage's mountain.

Then she closed her eyes. She could feel the earthquakes. She could hear the panicked screams that sounded oh so much like her son's when he was about to get a beating.

"So, Sakura's back too. It seems that she has already found Naruto. Goodness knows how she does it."

Hinata then put a hand to her chin. She contemplated her next actions, then smiled. It was a wicked smile, borne of years of being married to a sadistic troublemaker and fathering a second one.

"Well, if my dear Sakura is handling _my_ husband, then it would seem that no one is handling _hers_." Hinata's dark smile only grew. "It seems it is time for this village to experience the wrath of the Prank Queen of Konoha."

Elsewhere, Sasuke's spine shivered to the point of almost breaking.

XxX

"Naruto."

"NO," Naruto screamed. With a yell reminiscent of his now estranged son, the Seventh Hokage ducked under yet another house being thrown at him. This was... the fourth? The fourth one thrown at him. When Sakura was feeling less vindictive, she only threw horses, people, and stalls.

"I just want to talk to you," Sakura said, her face calm despite her thunderous pursuit. Naruto threw caution to the wind and looked over his shoulder at one of his closest friends.

She had another damn house in her hand. Not hands. She had a house in just one hand and carried it over her head as if it were some kind of paperweight.

Naruto turned back to his fleeing. "I DOUBT THAT."

"Hmm," Sakura pondered. "How would you know that if you don't ever stop?"

"YOU'RE THROWING A BOAT AT ME," Naruto responded. "WHERE DID YOU EVEN GET A BOAT?"

"You're asking the wrong questions," Sakura said, her face in a pout. "Listen, I'm not even mad."

"SAKURA, WHERE DID YOU GET THE THIRD RAIKAGE'S STATUE?"

Indeed, Sakura held in her hands a piece of the Third Raikage's statue. It was commonly found in the Village Hidden in the Clouds and weighed well over several tons.

Sakura ignored his question as she chucked the thing at the orange boy. "I just want to talk to you. I promise that is the only reason that I'm throwing these things at you."

"I'M NOT FALLING FOR THAT AGAIN."

"Then I suppose that you will just be falling, then."

At that prompt, Naruto swiftly jumped high into the air. Not a second after he had done so, had the world exploded. Fissures creaked throughout all of the Village Hidden in the Leaves, and entire tufts of land were uprooted.

It was a disaster worse than Pein's.

Sakura looked bored.

"SAKURA YOU'RE DESTROYING THE VILLAGE."

"And you'll be next if you don't stop running."

"NO."

"So be it," Sakura responded with a sigh. She then picked up an entire chunk of upturned land and continued her pursuit.

XxX

Sasuke had never before wished that he had the ability to retreat to his other dimensions as much as he did right now. The Rinnegan really was a useful ability, and had he had it, maybe he wouldn't be in the situation he was in right now.

It all started when he heard the thunderous explosions. Since he didn't _remember_ anyone attacking the village at this point in time, that could only mean one thing.

His wife was back, and as usual, she beelined it to Naruto to take her anger out on him. Sasuke still wasn't sure why, but Sakura's default outlet for her anger was still her blonde teammate.

So there was one monstrosity out of the way. Sasuke breathed a sigh of relief when he realized that the first disaster was avoided.

Then his breathe caught in his throat as all around him a feeling of just pure _wrongness_ pervaded the world. It seeped into his pores from everywhere he could conceive. Even the very ground felt tainted and dangerous.

"Oh, right. Hinata."

"That's right," a voice whispered into the Uchiha's ear. It was somehow both as smooth as silk and as sharp as a knife. "Me."

Sasuke didn't even look back. Not a second after he heard the words, he took off, bustling through the village like a bat out of hell. Not really caring about the people he knocked over in his attempt to flee, Sasuke tried his hardest to escape the pure terror that was behind him.

Only to run straight into a dirt wall that wasn't in front of him less than a second ago.

"Urgh," Sasuke grumbled. He tried to extract himself from the wall, but his hands stuck to where he tried to push off. Behind him, Sasuke could hear laughter.

"You should really pay more attention to where you're going, Uchiha-san."

"When did you even have time to set up traps?" Sasuke asked.

Hinata giggled. "A true Prank Master needs very little time to set up menial pranks." Sasuke couldn't see it, but Hinata's smile grew. He felt it though. It felt evil. "Now, when you see my extended pranks? Oh boy. You're really gonna wonder how I did _those_."

"You've been spending too much time with Naruto," Sasuke sighed. Already he was burning through the sap on the wall with a low powered Amaterasu.

"And you haven't been spending enough time with him," Hinata responded. "Otherwise, you might have been able to dodge some of these."

"Some of wha-" was all the raven haired boy was able to get out before a literal horde of weaponry came flying at him from literally nowhere. Thinking quickly, the last Uchiha burned away the last of the sap and simply headbutted the wall he was attached to with all of the Earth natured chakra he could muster. It wasn't a lot, so a lot of the force was from the headbutt, but Sasuke managed to break through the wall and dodge the weaponry.

He rolled to safety on the outer side of the wall, his forehead bleeding but no worse for the wear. "Are you insane, woman? You could've killed me!"

"So it appears that you could dodge that just by being a competent enough ninja," Hinata pondered. "Interesting."

"Are you... are you ignoring me?" Sasuke asked. Hinata waved her hand at him.

"You're still here?" Hinata asked. "Well, that's good, I suppose. I'm going to need you to run through the rest of the traps that I put up around the village as well. I need to see which are ninja proof and which aren't. Go on now. Shoo."

"I'm... I'm not your dog!" Sasuke growled. He made to move on the young Hyuuga, but the smaller girl didn't budge. Instead, she pulled out a whistle. She took a deep breath before blowing into it.

Sasuke's head exploded, such was the depth of the pain.

"Bad Sasuke!" Hinata yelled as if she were talking to a dog. "Go run the Death Gauntlet!"

"Y-you call it the Death Gauntlet? Why would I run through something called the Death Gauntlet?"

Hinata blew the whistle again. Sasuke collapsed from the pain.

"What is that!?"

"Naruto made it. He said it only works on 'brooding assholes' that you 'need to train to get better'."

Sasuke sighed. Of course he would.

"Now, are you gonna run my Ultra Death Gauntlet, or not?"

Sasuke glared at the Hyuuga. "I hate you."

Hinata made to blow into the whistle, but Sasuke was already gone. Smiling, Hinata pursued the boy.

XxX

The Third Hokage watched as his village was being destroyed by four brats who had no business wielding that kind of power.

He turned back to the room he was supposed to be supervising. "All four of those children are going to be in the Chunin Exams. Three of them are on the same team. Anyone else want to submit their team for testing?"

When absolutely no one else stepped up, Sarutobi Hiruzen sighed. He turned back to the wanton destruction that was happening outside his window and watched for as long as he could before the headache overwhelmed him. Then he turned back to the assembled ninja before him.

"Since Kakashi isn't here, I'm going to have to field my question to the one person who can answer my inquiries. Kurenai, what are you teaching these children?"

Kurenai, a new Jonin, blinked her red eyes rapidly. She looked around the room, as if anyone else would be able to provide her with the answers that she apparently did not have. When nothing came up and no one stepped forward, the woman sighed.

"I haven't been teaching Hinata. She's my only student out there, by the way. Thus far I've been trying to teach her to better her confidence. Judging by her current performance, however..."

Kurenai had to trail off as Hinata, in pursuit of the Uchiha, barrelled through a small mansion. Their passage levelled the entire building.

"… it seems that I have succeeded."

"Indeed," the Hokage agreed. "A tad _too_ well it seems. They are running around the Village, destroying everything that they can. This needs to stop."

"Excuse me, Master Hokage," a no name Jonin asked. As he stepped forward, he afforded his leader a small bow. "If I could be so blunt, why don't you simply send your ANBU after them?"

To this, the Hokage simple gestured outside once more. The assembled Jonin looked outside to see that there were, in fact, entire squads of ANBU trying to subdue the children. They weren't doing very well. In fact, the children didn't even seem to notice them.

"Oh," the no name Jonin said. His mouth went dry as he saw the Jinchuuriki Rasengan an ANBU out of the way in his mad dash away from his pink haired teammate. Said pink haired teammate punched that same ANBU into the sky.

He was still going.

"What do we do, dad?" Asuma asked. Outside the window, the Uchiha attempted to put the Hyuuga in a genjutsu. Hinata literally smacked the attempt out of the way. The chakra, visible to normal eyes now, went sailing and hit a villager. That villager, initially stunned by the impact of the technique, calmly rose from his position on the ground, walked over to the nearest stall, and picked up a discarded knife.

"I have seen true pain and decided that life isn't worth living anymore. This shall be my last, solemn mercy to myself. I will embrace the sweet nothingness that awaits beyond death."

The lesser ninja had to turn their heads. Asuma only gaped.

"W-what did he see?" Asuma turned to his father. "What the hell did he see?"

Both the Third Hokage and Kurenai, the only two in the room who could recognize a genjutsu at a glance, stared with wide eyes at the spectacle before them. They looked to one another and concluded in an unspoken agreement. With a minute nod of the head, they turned to their son/potential love interest.

"The mysteries of the Sharingan can never be fully explored," the Third Hokage said, rubbing his beard. His eyes were shifty as he attempted to focus on anything but his disbelieving son.

"Bull," Asuma said, his voice rising. "I saw that look on your face. You know what just happen-" Asuma stopped when he felt a hand on his shoulder. Kurenai looked at him, a grave expression on her face.

"The mysteries of the Sharingan can never be fully explored."

Asuma decided to leave it at that.

"Regardless," the Hokage continued. He was looking out the window again. "We cannot allow them to continue this. I'm calling for all active duty Shinobi not currently busy to help in apprehending them. If we work together, we can stop them." The Hokage then chuckled. "Maybe put them in time out, or something."

"Yes, Lord Hokage!" the room of upper level ninja chorused. With a snap of the old man's fingers, the assembled ninja disappeared, not a single sound made amongst them.

The old Hokage sighed. He took a seat in his chair and swiveled it to look out his window once more. From this point, he could see all of his beloved village.

He could see half of it going up in flames.

"Damn kids," the old man grumbled. "If I have to go out there myself, I'm going to be very upset."

XxX

"Hey, Sakura?" Naruto asked. He was running in the main street of Konoha, but suddenly increased his pace. Using his chakra to stick to the walls of the buildings, he ran halfway up one before taking off and flipping in the air. It was all he could do to avoid yet another building being thrown at him.

"Yes, Naruto?" Sakura asked innocently. In the time it took her to speak, Sakura had torn the building Naruto had just jumped off from the ground. She cocked her arm back.

"Don't you notice something… odd?" Naruto asked. He created a Shadow Clone with no hand signs, then used it to springboard into the air. Naruto winced as the clone's memories of being hit with a house came back to him.

"Hmm," Sakura pondered. She scaled the rubble of the now destroyed building and used it to follow Naruto into the sky. She had chased the boy many a time before. He was no Sasuke, he couldn't outright outrun her, or shift into another dimension. What he _could_ do, however, was disappear once you lost sight of him for even a second. "Do you mean the ANBU that have been chasing us?"

"No," Naruto responded. Coincidentally, he used an ANBU that had tried to tackle him out of the air to change his trajectory. Pushing off his back, Naruto shot towards a roof that was now below him, and dashed in a different direction. "I think we took out like, half of the ANBU anyway. I'm talking about the overwhelming amounts of… youth."

Sakura, not one to be outdone, turned herself over in the air and punched it. She _punched_ the air. The force of the blow rocketed her towards her blond teammate. Using the momentum from her punch, she pursued Naruto across the rooftops. "Yeah," she said. "I have noticed quite a lot of it. Why?"

"You don't think…" Naruto trailed off.

"Impossible," Sakura responded. "Why would _they_ be after us? If anything, they'd be cheering on our 'exuberant youthfulness'."

"Is that better or worse?"

"So much worse," Sakura responded, shuddering slightly. "So for our sanity, let's hope that Lord Hokage sent him after us."

There was a loud crash nearby. A building collapsed under the overwhelming amounts of Youth that just barreled through it. Already seeing the green missile heading towards him, Naruto stopped, and allowed Sakura to catch up. The pink haired girl, seeing the bigger problem for what it was, stopped in front of Naruto and held up her hand. For good measure, she braced herself as well.

Sakura, who could effectively handle several tons of weight with no problem, was still nearly bowled over as she caught the foot of one Might Gai.

"DYNAMIC ENTRY," the esteemed eccentric Jonin yelled. "THE MIGHTY GREEN BEAST OF KONOHA, MIGHT GAI, IS HERE TO APPREHEND YOU!"

"All of my worst nightmares. They are coalescing right here, right now, in front of my very eyes." Naruto deadpanned. He then turned around and caught the foot of yet another green missile.

"While I cannot match up to Gai-sensei's incredible might, I, Rock Lee, will do my best!"

"Oh god," Sakura gasped, her voice tense. "It gets worse."

"INDEED," Gai screamed, his voice shattering both windows and eardrums. "THOUGH YOUR YOUTFULNESS IS INDEED IMPRESSIVE, OUR YOUTHFUL LORD HOKAGE HAS ASKED YOU TO STOP DESTROYING OUR VILLAGE." Gai then, somehow, disengaged while still being midair and spun. His midair roundhouse kick impacted Sakura's raised arm, and came to a stop. "SO, WILL YOU?"

Ignoring the fact that Gai had just kicked through a house to get to her, Sakura just braced her arm with her other one. Gai was disabled in the future, so Sakura had almost forgotten just how powerful he was.

"I'm going to have to decline," Sakura hummed. She had started to push back the man who was pushing her while _still in the air_. "I have to mete out some well deserved punishment."

"I SEE," Gai shouted. His face was, for once, grim. "Then it appears that we have the same goal in mind."

Gai then flipped once more, _somehow_. He then kicked at Sakura's arm again. She wasn't prepared this time, so she was kicked away. "Lee, can you handle young Naruto?"

"Yes, sensei!" The mini clone screamed. "And if I cannot, I will run a thousa-"

Naruto punched the boy with a Rasengan powered punch. He knew that Lee would shrug it off. "None of that. Sakura!" Naruto screamed. "I'll finish up with Lee and follow up with you, okay?"

"Right!" Sakura yelled. She fell into her Slug Style stance. "Don't get beat up!"

"Same!" Naruto yelled.

And just like that, the two duos split up.

XxX

Hinata and Sasuke hadn't even noticed that there were people pursuing them. Hinata had set up _very_ a many traps.

"How… how?" Kurenai gasped. She was currently being held in the air by rope that bound her BDSM style. Below her was a pool of water that contained sharks. Being a genjutsu master, she noticed the small one that made her much more afraid of the situation than she actually was, but for some reason she couldn't dispel it.

Across from her, Asuma was much worse off.

"HOW?" he yelled. Kurenai couldn't describe his situation very well. It was that complicated. All she knew was that it involved honey, fire, and a lot of broken lightbulbs.

Too many broken lightbulbs.

Suspended in the air, Kurenai looked over the village she was in. Hinata and Sasuke were getting farther and farther away, with the latter dodging all of the former's traps, albeit by small margins.

In their wake were many other ninja who were attempting to pursue them. They had tried, and failed, to escape the ambient traps.

"What do we do now?" Kurenai thought. She was helpless as everyone else.

She just hoped someone would come get her down.

XxX

"This is…" Tenten trailed off.

"Becoming a lot bigger than we thought, yes," Hagoromo hummed. "I didn't expect them to start working together."

"Sasuke and Hinata aren't working together," Tenten protested. Orochimaru pointed to the screen.

"If that isn't working together, then I don't know what is."

On screen Sasuke desperately tried to outrun Hinata. He tripped a different trap every other step, but managed to avoid them all. Every so often, however, the two would look off to the side, towards ninja jumping towards them. They would then jump to angle the encroaching ninja into premade traps.

"Oh," Tenten said, her voice lowering. "The Prank Queen of Konoha is truly fearsome."

" **Some say she surpasses her husband** ," Kyuubi grunted. He looked bored. He scratched at the floor where the seal was. Some of it cracked from exposure to his chakra.

Kyuubi smiled.

"This isn't good," Tenten pondered. She approached the screen, her face scrunched up and her eyes intent on the screen. "If they work together, there is no force in the world that can stop them."

"We must split them up," Kakashi hummed.

They all stared at the screen.

XxX

Two green spandex wearing ninja collided with each other. An audible crack echoed through the area as the master and student hit. Effectively knocked out, the two fell to the ground as one.

"That was… something," Sakura said. She was panting. "Why are they so strong? Were they always this strong?"

"Yeah," Naruto responded. He had an easier fight, but even still, he had much better endurance. "Have you gotten it all out?"

"Yeah," Sakura gasped. "Now, what is going on here?"

"It appears we were dragged to the past," a new voice said. Naruto shivered, and Sakura turned around with a smile.

"Hinata! You came back too?" She then looked down. "And you found Sasuke!"

Sasuke was tied up at the girl's feet.

"Yeah. You found Naruto?"

Naruto attempted to jump away. A very strong hand gripped his neck.

"Yeah," Sakura answered. "So what do we do now?"

The four looked around. They came to a conclusion rather quickly.

"Chaos?" Hinata asked.

"Chaos," the other three chorused. Hinata leaned down and untied Sasuke. Rubbing at his wrists, he coughed.

"If you find Tenten, Orochimaru, or Kakashi, kick them especially hard. They're the ones who brought you back here."

Hinata and Sakura nodded. Then, as one, the four took off.

XxX

"They… they can't find us, right?"

Kyuubi literally exploded. The fox had finally scratched a dent in the seal holding him. His chakra radiated around the room, scaring the ones in there and essentially being a beacon for anyone with even a little bit of talent as a sensor.

Naruto and Sakura were excellent sensors. Hinata and Sasuke could literally see chakra.

"They're… on their way, aren't they?"

" **You should be worried more about me** ," Kyuubi chanted. Now in his human form, he took on his own chakra cloak. " **Please do survive until they reach here**."

XxX

Sarutobi sighed, he stood up from his seat and threw off his robes.

"I guess it's time to show these children who's boss."

The God of Shinobi took to the field once more."

XxX

"It's a shame," Naruto sighed. He parried the sword coming for him and unleashed a wave of sand from the Kunai he used to do it. "I wanted to go on a really long journey in order to visit each Jinchuuriki, and absorb the chakra from them one by one, getting into ridiculous situations and eventually using it to tear ourselves from this time loop myself. Now, it just feels like everything is coming to a head so quickly."

"Is that so, Naruto?" Hinata asked. "It is okay, we can see our children quicker."

"But still," Sasuke chimed in. He put several ninja around him in a genjutsu simultaneously. "It feels rushed. Like the gods were quickly getting tired of us and just wants to send us home."

"I don't think so," Sakura chimed in. "Besides, we may be able to come back at any time." Sakura shrugged. "We don't know what the future holds."

"I know what the future holds," an aged voice chimed from behind them. "You guys. Please, go back."

The children turned around, different ninja being held in their hands.

"Excuse me?" Naruto asked.

"You guys are causing too much trouble in the past," Sarutobi repeated. "I need you to go back to the future."

"Wait," Naruto asked, his voice incredulous. "You knew we were from the future this entire time?"

"Of course I did. And I need you to go back. You're causing too much trouble."

"But, Lord Hokage…"

"No, Sakura," the Hokage cut her off. "You're doing too much and I'm sending you home."

"Because, we're…"

"Trouble, yes, Sasuke. Let's send you home now, okay?"

Elsewhere, an explosion went off. Kyuubi stepped out of a building holding four unconscious bodies. Stepping near the others, he dropped them on the ground, then postured on them.

" **I am the King of Everything!** " he yelled. Sarutobi whacked him on the head with Enma, his Monkey Staff.

"Take him too," the old Hokage muttered. "Are you ready?"

The four children nodded.

"Then goodbye." The Hokage then went through several handsigns.

"Does anyone else find it ironic that we were first sent here by a crotchety old man with a staff, and now we're being sent back by one?"

Despite being trapped in a technique, Sarutobi still smacked Naruto over the head.

"You better be a better Hokage than you are a ninja."

Naruto chuckled. "I suppose I am." The boy then grinned. "I'll make you proud."

Sarutobi chuckled as well. "I'm sure you will.

The time travelers then faded away.

"Lord Hokage!" a nearby trapped ninja yelled. "If they're gone, why does our universe even exist anymore?"

"Fuck."

XxX

Naruto opened his eyes. Hands roving over his body, he realized that he was in his old body again.

"Was it… was it all a dream?" Naruto asked himself. With a sudden intensity, the boy reached over and pressed his intercom.

"Shizune!" Naruto yelled. "What was the last thing I told you?"

"Uh," Shizune responded on the other side of the intercom. "That you got away with tricking, and I quote, 'the GOD of Shinobi?'"

Naruto then leaned back in his chair. It was good to be him.

" _This feels like a cop out_ ," Naruto thought, then closed his eyes.

XxX

Elsewhere, someone was having a very different experience.

"WHY AM I HERE?" Neji shouted. He then dodged yet another Rasengan.

"I don't remember seeing you around," a mini Naruto called. He had a cowlick in front of his face. "Hyuuga imposters must be dealt with. You can't have my sister!"

Neji looked to said sister. She looked like she was far more dangerous than the brother protecting her.

"As soon as you beat big brother, we can play, Neji-neesan."

Neji shivered. He contemplated the virtues of just losing to his nephew.

* * *

 _ **As a crack fic, I felt this to be the most appropriate ending. It's not serious, and it's not all too gratifying either.  
**_

 _ **It's out of left field and honestly stupid. Just like everything else.**_

 _ **Thank you everyone. I will try to keep improving so I can bring you better stories.** _

_**I don't usually do this, but I've been reading a lot of Coeur Al'Aran, an excellent RWBY fanfiction writer. He's on a much better schedule than me, and he's also much better at this whole writing thing. If you like RWBY and fanfiction, I recommend giving his stories a try.**_


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